A  Ken  of  Kipling 


BEING 

A  BIOGRAPHICAL  SKETCH  OF 
RUDYARD  KIPLING,  WITH  AN 
APPRECIATION  AND  SOME 
ANECDOTES  .•  .•  .•  .•  .•  .•  .•  .•  .•  .• 


By 
WILL  M.  CLEMENS 


AUTHOR  OP 


Theodore  Roosevelt,  the  American  "  "  The  Life  of  Mark 
Twain,"  "The  Depew  Story  Book,"  etc.,  etc. 


NEW  AMSTERDAM   BOOK   COMPANY 

156  FIFTH  AVENUE  .  .   .   NEW  YORK 

MDCCCXCIX. 


Copyright,  1899,  by 
WILL  M.  CLEMENS 
All  rights  reserved  in  the 
United  States  and 
Great  Britain 


To 

'A  Colonial  Policy  of  Expansion,"  whereby 

Great  Britain  gave  to  the  world  a 

Rudyard  Kipling,  this  little 

book  is  solemnly 

dedicated. 


2026887 


ILLUSTRATIONS 

Photogravure  Portrait  of  Rudyard  Kipling. 

— Frontispiece. 
Mr.  Kipling's  House  at  Brattleboro,  Vt. 

An  Original  Illustration  by  Rudyard  Kipling. 


CONTENTS. 

!•  PAGE 

Kipling  the  Man,          ....      9 

II. 
His  Work  in  Prose  and  Verse,    .        .     42 

III. 
Poems  for  a  Purpose 57 

IV. 
Kipling's  Religion 71 

V. 
Anecdotes  of  Kipling 79 

VI. 
Kipling  and  Mark  Twain,    .        .        .  109 

VII. 
The  Kipling  Books,     ..        .        .        .138 


A  KEN  OF  KIPLING. 


i. 

KIPLING   THE   MAN. 
IN  Bombay — 

"  Between  the  palms  and  the  sea, 
Where  the  world-end  steamers  wait," 

Riidyard  Kipling  was  born  in  1865, 
on  the  thirtieth  day  of  December.  His 
father,  John  Lockwood  Kipling,  an 
English  artist  holding  an  official  posi- 
tion in  India,  was  a  native  of  Burslem 
in  Staffordshire.  He  was  the  eldest  son 
of  the  Rev.  Joseph  Kipling.  The  early 
years  of  his  life  he  spent  in  the  Burslem 
potteries  as  a  modeler  and  designer  of 
terra  cotta.  He  was  a  clever  young 
9 


A  KEN  OF  KIPLING. 

man,  a  great  reader,  a  true  artist, 
though  somewhat  eccentric.  He  at- 
tended a  picnic  one  day  with  the  other 
young  people  of  the  neighborhood,  at  a 
pretty  little  English  lake  between  the 
villages  of  Rudyard  and  Bushton,  not 
far  from  Burslem.  John  Kipling  there 
met  a  pretty  English  girl,  Alice  Mac- 
donald,  the  daughter  of  the  Rev.  G.  B. 
Macdonald,  a  Wesleyan  minister  at 
Endon.  He  fell  in  love  with  her  at 
once.  They  met  very  often,  and  their 
engagement  was  soon  after  announced. 
Then  John  went  to  the  art  schools  in 
Kensington,  and  was  afterward  sent 
out  to  direct  the  art  schools  of  Bombay. 
When  he  went  to  India  he  took  pretty 
Alice  Macdonald  along  as  his  wife. 

As  professor  of  architecture  and 
sculpture  at  the  School  of  Art  in  Bom- 
bay, Mr.  Kipling  produced  some  very 
able  students.  He  instructed  his  pupils 


KIPLING  THE  MAN. 

more  especially  in  modelling,  that  when 
the  time  came  he  might  have  a  staff  of 
able  men  to  assist  him  in  the  work  of 
making  casts  of  the  mythological  sculp- 
ture of  the  old  and  celebrated  rock- 
cut  temples  of  the  central  provinces 
of  India.  This  laborious  and  difficult 
task  occupied  Mr.  Kipling  and  his  staff 
for  several  years,  and  the  results  of 
their  labors  are  now  to  be  seen  at  the 
South  Kensington  and  many  of  the 
other  great  museums  throughout  the 
world.  In  1881  Mr.  Kipling  was  ap- 
pointed curator  of  the  government 
museum  at  Lahore,  and  here  he  ac- 
complished great  results  during  the 
years  that  he  held  this  honorable  posi- 
tion. In  1891,  Mr.  Kipling  published 
a  volume  entitled  "  Beast  and  Man  in 
India. " 

Mr.    Kipling's  wife,   the    mother  of 
Rudyard,  was  a  woman  of  great  beauty 


A  KEN  OF  KIPLING. 

and  charm.  She  was  one  of  three  sis- 
ters noted  for  their  intellect  and  cul- 
ture, all  of  whom  married  distinguished 
Englishmen  and  artists.  One  became 
the  wife  of  Sir  Edward  Poynter,  who 
succeeded  Sir  John  Millais  as  president 
of  the  Royal  Academy,  while  the  other 
married  Sir  Edmund  Burne-Jones. 

When  Mr.  Kipling  and  his  young 
wife  arrived  in  Bombay,  they  were  as- 
signed to  their  government  quarters  on 
the  Maidan.  These  quarters  were  on 
the  sites  of  the  ancient  ramparts  of  the 
citadel  of  Bombay,  which  Sir  Bartle 
Frere  had  ordered  removed,  and  the 
Maidan  was  an  open  park  stretching 
between  the  fort  and  the  business  por- 
tion of  the  city. 

In  the  course  of  time  a  son  was  born 
to  the  Ziplings.  Their  first  meeting 
at  Rudyard  Lake  must  have  been  the 
pretty  bit  of  sentiment  of  their  lives, 


KIPLING  THE  MAN. 

for  when  they  named  the  son  they  took 
for  him  that  of  the  little  lake  on  the 
banks  of  which  they  first  saw  each  oth- 
er. They  called  the  boy  "  Ruddie  "  in 
a  familiar  way,  and  being  a  first  child, 
the  parents  made  a  great  pet  of  him. 
As  a  lad  he  had  unusual  aptitude  for 
learning  and  scorned  commonplace 
toys,  but  any  sort  of  instructive  puzzle 
or  game  that  required  thought  and  in- 
telligence appealed  to  him  at  once. 
Books  were  his  great  pleasure.  In 
fact,  he  was  quite  beyond  his  years  in 
intellect.  He  had  a  will  of  his  own, 
as  a  boy,  and  at  times  asserted  it  in 
spite  of  the  remonstrances  of  his  par- 
ents. 

Rudyard  at  the  age  of  twelve  accom- 
panied his  father  to  England,  and  thence 
to  Paris,  to  visit  the  Exhibition,  which 
was  one  of  the  chief  delights  of 
his  boyhood.  He  enjoyed  this  first 
13 


A  KEN  OF  KIPLING. 

glimpse  of  European  civilization  more 
perhaps  because  of  his  father's  compan- 
ionship. They  were  lovers  always — 
this  father  and  son — the  ideal  affection 
being  bestowed  upon  each  other. 

Mr.  Kipling,  since  to  manhood 
grown,  has  said  with  modesty  of  his 
father  and  mother:  "All  that  I  am,  I 
owe  to  them. " 

The  elder  Kipling,  before  his  return 
to  India,  placed  Rudyard  in  the  United 
Service  College  "Westward  Ho,"  in 
the  parish  of  Northam,  North  Devon, 
an  institution  intended  chiefly  for  the 
education  of  sons  of  Anglo- Indian  civil 
and  military  officers.  From  his  thir- 
teenth year  to  his  eighteenth,  this  un- 
dersized, near-sighted  lad  was  an  in- 
different scholar,  neither  a  prodigy  nor 
a  dullard.  Not  always  at  the  head  of 
his  class,  nor  within  reach  of  the  top 
even,  he  succeeded,  however,  when  he 


KIPLING  THE  MAN. 

left  the  college  in  1882,  in  taking-  away 
with  him  a  well-earned  first  prize  in 
English  literature.  For  two  years  of 
his  five  at  the  college  he  was  the  editor 
of  the  United  Service  College  Chronicle, 
to  which  he  contributed  many  a  clever 
sketch  or  verse. 

He  returned  to  India  to  his  father's 
house  at  Lahore,  early  in  1883,  and, 
journalism  being  his  bent,  he  became 
sub-editor  of  the  Civil  and  Military 
Gazette.  In  Lahore,  which  is  some  two 
or  three  days'  travel  from  Bombay,  a 
large  building,  embowered  in  siris  and 
peepul  trees,  bears  across  its  front  the 
legend:  "The  Civil  and  Military  Ga- 
zette Press."  In  the  office  of  the  Ga- 
zette, the  natives — Hindu,  Mohamme- 
dan, and  Sikh — labor  side  by  side  in 
setting  up  the  type  and  working  the 
machines.  Eurasians  and  domiciled 
British  subjects  supply  the  staff  of 
15 


A  KEN  OF  KIPLING. 

"readers,"  while  the  imported  Anglo- 
Indians  fill  the  editorial  chairs. 

In  Kipling's  day,  the  editorial  staff 
of  the  Gazette,  comprising  two  men,  did 
the  entire  work  of  getting  out  the  daily 
paper;  and  if  one  wants  to  know  how 
Kipling  worked  as  one  of  the  two  men 
who  produced  the  Gazette  daily,  one 
has  only  to  ask  Mian  Rukhn-ud-din,  the 
Mohammedan  foreman  printer;  Bahi 
Pertab  Singh,  the  Sikh  bookkeeper; 
Babu  Hakim  AH,  the  Moslem  clerk ;  or 
faithful  Habibulla,  the  willing  cha- 
prassi,  on  whose  head  Kipling's  office 
box  came  and  went  daily.  They  will 
tell  how  Kipling  worked. 

Briefly,  the  daily  work  of  Mr.  Kipling 
on  the  Gazette  was  as  follows:  i.  To 
prepare  for  press  all  the  telegrams  of 
the  day;  2.  To  provide  all  the  extracts 
and  paragraphs;  3.  To  make  headed 

articles   out  of    official   reports,    etc. ; 
16 


KIPLING  THE  MAN. 

4.  To  write  such  editorial  notes  as  he 
might  have  time  for;  5.  To  look  gen- 
erally after  all  sports,  outstation,  and 
local  intelligence ;  6.  To  read  all  proofs 
except  the  editorial  matter.  For  a  few 
hundreds  of  rupees  a  month,  he  did  the 
work  of  at  least  two  men. 

As  an  outside  reporter  he  met  with 
many  strange  adventures.  Probably 
his  most  distasteful  task  was  his  mis- 
sion to  interview  a  notorious  fakir, 
about  whom  there  was  great  religious 
excitement  in  the  Punjab,  as  he  was 
reported  to  have  cut  out  his  tongue  in 
order  that  it  might,  with  the  help  of 
the  goddess  Kali,  grow  again  in  six 
weeks,  and  thus  prove  the  verity  of  the 
Hindu  faith.  Kipling  never  found  the 
fakir,  but  through  a  hot  Indian  day  he 
found  himself  misdirected  from  one 
unsavory  slum  of  Amritsar  to  another, 

till  he  was  sick  to  death  of  his  quest. 
2  17 


A  KEN  OF  KIPLING. 

It  no  doubt  suited  the  fakir's  scheme 
to  be  evasive  when  a  sahib  was  looking 
for  him,  and  on  his  return  to  Lahore  it 
was  a  very  dirty  and  travel-stained 
Kipling  who  tumbled  into  the  editorial 
rooms  of  the  Gazette. 

The  Duke  of  Connaught,  then  mili- 
tary commander  of  the  Northwestern 
district  of  India,  was  occasionally  a 
visitor  to  the  house  of  the  Kiplings. 
When  he  met  Rudyard  he  became 
greatly  interested  in  him,  and  in  the 
course  of  conversation  remarked: 
"  What  are  you  going  to  do,  Mr.  Kip- 
ling, now  that  you  are  in  India  again? 
What  would  you  like  to  do? " 

"  I  would  like,  sir,  to  live  with  the 
army  for  a  time,  and  go  to  the  frontier 
to  write  up  Tommy  Atkins. " 

The  duke  considered  the  matter,  and 
finally  gave  him  carte  blanche  to  go  to 

any  military  station  in  his  command, 
18 


KIPLING  THE  MAN. 

and,  if  he  wished,  go  to  the  frontier  and 
live  with  officers  or  men,  and  if  at  any 
time  he  required  an  escort  he  could 
have  one;  and  so  Rudyard  was  thus 
given  opportunity  to  make  acquain- 
tance with  Tommy  Atkins.  To  the 
Civil  and  Military  Gazette  he  contrib- 
uted many  of  his  earlier  poems  and 
stories,  and  the  paper,  having  many 
military  men  as  patrons,  was  a  proper 
enough  receptacle  for  his  departmental 
ditties  and  earlier  tales  of  the  Indian 
hills.  This  was  the  beginning,  but  the 
road  from  journalism  to  literature  was 
indeed  a  rugged  one. 

After  fame  had  come  to  him,  Mr. 
Kipling  returned  once  on  a  flying  visit 
to  Lahore,  and  the  early  hours  of  the 
day  of  his  arrival  saw  him,  out  of 
sheer  love  of  the  old  work,  sitting  in 
the  familiar  office  chair  correcting  the 
same  old  proofs  on  the  same  old  yellow 


A  KEN  OF  KIPLING. 

paper,  with  Mian  Rukhn-ud-din,  the 
Mohammedan  foreman  printer,  flying 
round  the  press  with  green  turban 
awry,  informing  all  hands  that  "  Kup- 
puleen  Sahib"  had  returned.  There 
also  his  old  chief  editor  found  him 
when  he  came  to  the  office. 

A  little  volume  of  short  sketches, 
entitled  "The  Christmas  Quartet," 
written  by  members  of  the  Kipling 
family,  was  published  at  Lahore  in  De- 
cember, 1885,  at  the  humble  price  of 
two  shillings,  or  one  rupee  eight  an- 
nas. There  was  no  sale  for  the  little 
book.  Mr.  D.  P.  Masson,  then  the 
managing  proprietor  of  the  Civil  and 
Military  Gazette,  of  which  Kipling  was 
sub-editor,  says  he  could  have  "pa- 
pered Lahore  with  unsold  copies  of  the 
book."  The  market  value  of  the  Kip- 
ling "Quartet"  to-day  is  upward  of 
twelve  pounds  sterling. 


KIPLING  THE  MAN. 

The  following  year,  1886,  "Depart- 
mental Ditties"  appeared,  the  verses 
having  been  previously  published  in 
the  Civil  and  Military  Gazette.  The 
publication  of  the  book  was  merely 
local,  and  found  few  readers  beyond 
the  British  military  posts  in  India. 
The  same  year  he  published,  in  cheap 
form  for  local  circulation,  "  Plain  Tales 
from  the  Hills,"  "Soldiers  Three," 
"The  Story  of  the  Gadsbys,"  and  "In 
Black  and  White." 

In  many  ways  one  of  the  most  re- 
markable of  these  early  works  is  the 
volume  entitled  "  In  Black  and  White," 
published  by  A.  H.  Wheeler  &  Co.,  of 
Allahabad.  The  book  is  dedicated,  in 
a  tender  and  reverent  preface,  to  Mr. 
Kipling's  father.  The  elder  Mr.  Kip- 
ling illustrated  the  eight  stories  of 
"  Black  and  White"  in  a  series  of  about 
eighteen  large  drawings,  intended  for 


A  KEN  OF  KIPLING. 

some  future  Edition  de  luxe  of  the 
book.  These  drawings  are  stories  in 
themselves,  and  to  one  who  knows  the 
stories  lovingly  beforehand,  there  is 
a  perfectly  indescribable  richness  and 
suggestiveness  about  the  illustrations 
of  them.  Here  is  the  ne  plus  ultra  of 
the  sympathetic  interpretation  of  one 
art  by  another.  A  novelist  could  not 
cherish  his  own  work  more  tenderly 
than  the  father  has  cherished  his  son's 
conceptions,  and  the  elder  Mr.  Kipling 
possesses  technical  graphic  power  of  a 
quality  to  which  Thackeray  never  laid 
claim.  In  a  word,  never  before  were 
great  stories  so  illustrated  as  they  are 
here.  Only  a  native  of  India  can  quite 
fully  appreciate  the  drawings  or  the 
stories,  but  the  gems  must  be  obvious 
to  any  beholder. 

When  Mr.  Kipling  departed  from  In- 
dia in  1890  for  London  with  his  collec- 


KIPLING  THE  MAN. 

tion  of  stories — in  whose  possibilities 
he  had  himself  infinite  faith,  although, 
so  his  friends  said,  the  editors  of  the 
Indian  newspapers  in  which  he  pub- 
lished a  number  of  them  thought  but 
slightingly  of  them  and  begrudged 
them  the  space  they  filled — his  first 
idea  was  to  publish  them  in  America. 

He  went  first  to  Hong- Kong  with  his 
manuscripts  and  copies  of  the  queer 
little  books  he  had  published  in  Lahore 
and  Allahabad,  and  thence  to  San 
Francisco.  There  he  found  neither 
publisher  nor  friend,  nor  would  the 
newspapers  of  that  city  give  him  em- 
ployment. Is  it  not  natural  then  that 
some  years  later  he  should  write  of  San 
Francisco  as  "a  mad  city — inhabited 
for  the  most  part  by  perfectly  insane 
people,  whose  women  are  of  a  remark- 
able beauty." 

So  he  rmade  his  way  to  New  York, 
23 


A  KEN  OF  KIPLING. 

with  a  letter  of  introduction  in  his 
pocket  to  a  prominent  publishing' 
house.  By  some  curious  affinity  in 
lack  of  insight,  this  house  thought  no 
more  of  the  stories  than  did  the  un- 
appreciative  editors  out  in  India.  In 
fact,  they  not  only  refused  to  bring  out 
Kipling's  book,  but  they  also,  as  he 
thought,  treated  him  very  cavalierly 
— in  fact,  snubbed  him.  Those  who 
know  the  publishers  will  be  very  slow 
to  believe  this,  as  the  house  in  ques- 
tion is  noted  for  its  courtesy  in  all  its 
dealings,  and  a  highly  sensitive  author 
is  not  perhaps  the  best  judge  in  his 
own  case. 

Mr.  Kipling,  in  his  disgust,  made  no 
further  attempt  to  dispose  of  his  sto- 
ries on  this  side  of  the  Atlantic,  but 
sailed  away  for  England.  He  tried 
his  luck  in  London  with  better  success, 
so  far  as  finding  a  publisher  is  con- 
24 


KIPLING  THE  MAN. 

cerned.  His  stories  were  brought  out, 
but,  strange  as  it  may  appear  in  view 
of  their  subsequent  popularity,  they 
failed.  No  reviewer  seemed  to  be  im- 
pressed by  them — in  fact,  few  if  any 
reviewers  paid  any  attention  to  them 
at  all.  They  were  piled  up  on  the 
shelves  of  the  bookseller,  covered  with 
dust,  showing  no  prospect  of  resur- 
rection. Kipling  had  the  magnificent 
faith  of  genius  in  the  certainty  of  his 
triumph,  but  every  possible  trial  of  his 
faith  was  experienced.  It  looked  as  if 
the  triumph  would  be  postponed  until 
after  his  death,  when  some  student  of 
obscure  literature  in  the  latter  half 
of  the  twentieth  century  should,  by 
chance,  light  on  these  forgotten  vol- 
umes, and  wonder  at  the  stupidity  of 
his  ancestors  in  leaving  them  to  die 
stillborn.  Kipling  had  friends  and  rel- 
atives of  wealth  and  position  in  Eng- 
25 


A  KEN  OF  KIPLING. 

land;  but  he  was  too  proud  to  make 
himself  known  to  them  in  the  role 
of  unsuccessful  author,  when  he  had 
planned  to  visit  them  as  a  conquering 
hero.  They  knew  nothing  of  his  being 
in  London — and,  if  they  thought  any- 
thing about  him  at  all,  supposed  he 
was  in  India  or  wandering  about  in 
some  remote  corner  of  the  world. 
Kipling's  stock  of  money  had  given 
out.  His  lodgings  and  board  were  of 
the  most  economical.  It  looked  as  if 
he  intended  to  gain  his  living  by  some 
less  agreeable  occupation  than  story- 
writing. 

One  evening,  Edmund  Yates  sat 
down  to  dinner  at  his  club,  wondering 
what  would  make  a  good  stirring  arti- 
cle for  his  paper — the  London  World. 
He  asked  a  friend  at  an  adjoining  table 
if  he  did  not  know  of  something  that 

was  going  on.     Replied  the  friend : 
26 


KIPLING  THE  MAN. 

"Why  on  earth  don't  you  print  an 
interview  with  Rudyard  Kipling? " 

"Who  in  thunder  is  Rudyard  Kip- 
ling? "  asked  Yates. 

The  friend,  who  was  acquainted  with 
India  and  with  Kipling's  career  there, 
explained  that  he  was  a  brilliant  young 
man,  who  knew  India  as  few  men  knew 
it,  for  he  had  a  remarkable  faculty  of 
observation;  that  he  had  just  come 
home,  bringing  with  him  a  volume  of 
stories  which  he  had  published ;  1  that 
he  must  have  with  him,  also,  a  large 
stock  of  interesting  memorabilia  ;-«that 
Kipling  was  the  coming  man  in  story- 
telling ;  that  it  would  be  greatly  to  the 
credit  of  Yates'  paper  to  anticipate  the 
public  in  discovering  him;  that  he 
would  at  any  rate  have  much  to  say 
that  was  fresh  and  interesting. 

The  suggestions    thus    made    quite 

forcibly  struck  Mr.  Yates,  and  he  de- 
27 


A  KEN  OF  KIPLING. 

tailed  one  of  his  reporters  immediately 
to  interview  Kipling.  The  reporter 
had  some  difficulty  in  finding  Kipling, 
for  his  lodgings  were  obscure  and  his 
disgusted  publishers  had  not  kept  close 
track  of  his  address.  But  found  he 
was  at  last,  and  when  found  he  had  all 
the  hauteur  of  confident  genius  when 
most  prosperous,  in  being,  on  the 
whole,  rather  unwilling  to  submit  to 
the  advertisement  of  an  interview. 
The  reporter  prevailed  upon  him  to  do 
the  favor,  and  so  the  interview  ap- 
peared, some  two  columns,  in  a  much- 
read  paper.  It  created  no  little  talk. 
Among  others  who  read  it  with  interest 
was  the  book  reviewer  of  the  London 
Times.  He  remembered  in  an  indis- 
tinct way  that  Kipling's  stories  had 
come  to  his  desk,  and  that  he  had  let 
them  lie  there.  He  hunted  them  up, 

and,  in  the  light  of  what  he  now  knew 
28 


KIPLING  THE  MAN. 

about  the  man,  was  greatly  impressed 
by  them.  He  gave  them  a  half-column 
review  or  more,  and  that  with  a  great 
many  Englishmen  was  enough.  To 
find  Kipling  indorsed  in  the  Times  im- 
mediately set  them  to  work  reading 
them.  The  stories  no  longer  lay,  dust- 
covered,  on  the  publisher's  shelves. 
The  stock  on  hand  was  not  sufficient 
to  meet  the  sudden  demand,  and  the 
young  man  from  India  was  at  once  a 
much-discussed  author. 

Fame  came  with  the  reappearance  of 
"  Departmental  Ditties  "  and  "  Barrack- 
Room  Ballads. "  In  these  virile  poems, 
as  a  reviewer  said :  "  The  seamy  heroes 
sang  of  the  life  they  lived  with  all  their 
dramatic  virtues  as  well  as  their  dra- 
matic sins.  The  rugged  strength  of 
the  handling  and  the  brilliance  of  the 
color  were  recognized." 

His  acquaintance  with  Mr.  Wolcott 
29 


A  KEN  OF  KIPLING. 

Balestier,  and  his  collaboration  with 
that  promising  young  American  in  the 
writing  of  "The  Naulahka,"  brought 
him  to  America  again  in  1891.  The 
Balestiers  lived  on  a  farm  in  Vermont 
near  Brattle  boro,  and  Mr.  Kipling,  evi- 
dently taken  with  America  and  Ameri- 
can ways,  fell  in  love  with  Mr.  Ba- 
lestier's  sister,  Carolyn.  They  were 
married  in  All  Souls'  Church,  Portland 
Place,  London,  on  January  18,  1892, 
returning  to  Brattleboro  soon  after. 

When  this  "Avatar  of  Vishnuland," 
as  some  one  has  called  him,  built  for 
himself  an  American  home  on  the 
mountain  slopes  near  Brattleboro,  he 
was  already  a  known  figure  in  the 
world's  literature.  Making  his  home 
first  in  a  rented  cottage  near  the  site  of 
the  house  he  built,  he  completed  there 
his  "  Many  Inventions  "  and  wrote  some 
of  the  poems  of  " The  Seven  Seas." 
3° 


KIPLING  THE  MAN. 

The  Kipling  house,  near  Brattleboro, 
is  a  long,  low  building,  with  projecting 
roof  that  has  just  the  suggestion  of  a 
thatch.  A  wide  veranda  extends  along 
one  entire  end  of  the  house.  A  long 
hall  divides  the  house  in  the  middle, 
there  being  eleven  rooms  on  either  side 
of  the  hall.  The  house  looks  not  unlike 
an  Indian  bungalow.  It  is  built  on  a 
hillside  overlooking  the  Connecticut 
river,  and  the  only  entrance  is  in  the 
rear.  At  every  approach  to  the  house 
is  to  be  found  the  sign,  "  No  trespass- 
ing on  these  grounds." 

The  death  of  young  Balestier,  whose 
light  went  out  far  too  soon,  was  a  per- 
sonal loss  to  Mr.  Kipling — a  loss  that 
he  felt  keenly  for  some  years.  There 
was  genuine  love  and  appreciation,  as 
well  as  much  of  future  greatness,  in 
the  touching  verses  written  to  his 
friend  and  co-worker,  "  Who  had  done 


A  KEN  OF  KIPLING. 

his  work,  and  held  his  peace,  and  had 
no  fear  to  die." 

While  abroad  in  1897,  he  visited 
South  Africa,  on  pleasure  bent,  to  see 
new  peoples  and  new  scenes.  Upon 
his  arrival  at  the  Cape  he  was  greeted 
with  a  set  of  verses  after  his  own  man- 
ner of  making.  These  lines  were  from 
the  pen  of  one  of  his  own  Mulvaneys, 
a  private  soldier  of  the  name  of  Wal- 
lace. Here  are  three  stanzas  from  the 
verses  as  they  appeared  in  the  Cape 
Times  : 


'You  'ave  met  us  in  the  tropics,  you  'ave  met 

us  in  the  snows ; 

But  mostly  in  the  Punjab  an'  the  'Ills. 
You  'ave  seen  us  in  Mauritius,  where  the 

naughty  cyclone  blows, 
You  'ave  met  us  underneath  a  sun  that  kills, 

An'  we  grills! 
An'  I  ask  you.  do  we  fill  the  bloomin'  bills? 

'But  you're  our  particular  author,  you're  our 
patron  an'  our  friend. 
32 


KIPLING  THE  MAN. 

"You're  the  poet  of  the   cuss- word  an'  the 

swear, 
You're  the  poet  of  the  people,  where  the 

red-mapped  lands  extend, 
You're  the  poet  of  the  jungle  an'  the  lair, 

An'  compare. 
To  the  ever-speaking  voice  of  everywhere ! 

"There  are  poets  what  can  please  you  with 
their  primrose  vi'let  lays, 
There  are  poets  wot  can  drive  a  man  to 

drink ; 
But  it  takes  a  'pukka'  poet,  in  a  Patriotic 

Craze, 

To  make  a   chortlin'    nation   squirm   an' 
shrink, 

Gasp  an'  blink : 

An*  'eedless,  thoughtless  people  stop  and 
think ! " 

While  in  South  Africa,  Mr.  Kipling 
was  interviewed  by  a  journalist  at 
Buluwayo. 

"  Then  you're  going  home  to  tell  the 
public  all  about  us  in  '  Plain  Tales  from 
the  Veldt '?"  asked  the  journalist. 

"No,  no;  nothing  of  the  kind,"  an- 
swered Mr.  Kipling;  "  so  don't  you  run 
3  33 


A  KEN  OF  KIPLING. 

away  with  the  idea!  Mine  is  only  a 
flying  visit.  I'm  not  up  here  for  work, 
and  am  fairly  at  sea  in  these  parts. 
Besides,  the  town  will  have  grown  out 
of  all  knowledge  in  another  twelve 
months." 

"  So  on  the  whole  you've  been  favor- 
ably impressed,  Mr.  Kipling? " 

"  Impressed !  I  have  never  been  so 
impressed  with  any  community  in  the 
whole  world." 

The  interviewer  thus  wrote  of  him 
in  the  Cape  Times :  "  He  takes  his 
work  hard.  He  is  tremendously  in 
earnest  about  it ;  anxious  to  give  of  his 
best;  often  dissatisfied  with  his  best. 
He  is  quite  comically  dissatisfied  with 
success;  quite  tragically  haunted  by 
the  fear  that  this  or  that  piece  of  work, 
felt  intensely  by  himself  in  writing  and 
applauded  even  by  high  and  mighty 
critics,  is  in  reality  cheap  and  shoddy 
34 


KIPLING  THE  MAN. 

in  execution,  and  will  be  cast  in  dam- 
ages before  the  higher  court  of  pros- 
perity." 

Mr.  Kipling's  well-known  story 
"007"  is  reminiscent  of  an  experience 
of  his  at  the  Cape,  where  one  of  his 
pleasures  was  riding  on  engines.  He 
got  a  permit  to  ride  on  the  locomotives 
of  the  Cape  Government  railways,  and 
made  use  of  it. 

An  engineer  on  one  of  the  roads  re- 
ported that  he  was  not  up  to  schedule 
time  because  he  carried  "  one  of  those 
literary  swells,"  who  had  insisted  on 
running  the  engine. 

"  He  really  does  know  something 
about  it,"  declared  one  of  the  road 
superintendents.  And  in  this  knowing 
something  about  everything  he  writes 
lies  his  great  success. 

During  his  residence  in  1898  in  Eng- 
land, Mr.  Kipling  occupied  a  house  at 
35 


A  KEN  OF  KIPLING. 

Rottingdean,  a  quiet  little  Sussex  vil- 
lage near  the  sea.  It  is  called  the 
Elms,  from  its  surroundings  of  beauti- 
ful elm  and  ilex  trees.  In  this  quiet 
retreat  he  led  the  ideal  life  of  the  Eng- 
lish gentleman,  varying  his  routine  of 
work  and  reading  by  a  ride  of  three 
hours  every  morning  in  the  quiet  Eng- 
lish lanes  and  byways,  and  walking 
four  or  five  hours  later  in  the  day. 

In  February,  1899,  Mr.  Kipling,  ac- 
companied by  his  family,  returned  to 
the  United  States  for  a  month's  holi- 
day. He  was  met  in  New  York  har- 
bor by  a  most  unexpected  and  compli- 
mentary reception.  As  his  ship,  the 
Majestic,  ice-coated  and  laboring  in  the 
rough  sea,  neared  the  land,  Mr.  Kip- 
ling leaned  over  the  starboard  rail, 
watching  intently  three  men  in  oil- 
skins in  a  cockle-shell  of  a  boat.  They 
were  the  pilots  coming  aboard  to  take 
36 


KIPLING  THE  MAN. 

the  huge  vessel  into  port.  When  the 
little  boat  veered  off,  the  men  rested 
on  their  oars.  One  of  them  looked  up 
and  saw  Kipling.  Taking  off  his  oil- 
skin hat,  he  shouted,  in  a  voice  heard 
above  the  tempest: 

"  By  sport  of  Winter  weather 

We're  watty,  strained  and  scarred, 
From  the  kentledge  on  the  kelson 

To  the  slings  upon  the  yard, 
The  ocean's  had  her  will  of  us 
To  carry  all  away. " 

Then  he  added:  "Hurrah  for  Mul- 
vaney  and  the  boys  of  Lungtungpen!  " 
Mr.  Kipling  stood  for  a  moment  mo- 
tionless in  astonishment.  Then  he 
took  off  his  cap  and  waved  it  to  the  pi- 
lot. He  realized  that  even  pilots  have 
books  aboard  their  boats,  and  many 
hours  to  while  away  at  sea. 

As  the  Majestic  entered  New  York 
bay,  Mr.  Kipling  met  his  favorite  ene- 
my— the  newspaper  reporter.  He  met 
37 


A  KEN  OF  KIPLING. 

a  dozen  of  him,  each  clamoring  for  an 
interview.  He  denied  them  all,  and 
said  nothing  save  a  characteristic  bit, 
thus :  "  Every  effort  of  art  is  an  effort 
to  be  sincere.  There  is  no  surer  guide, 
I  am  sure,  than  the  determination  to 
tell  the  truth  that  one  feels." 

The  newspaper  men  left,  singing 
softly,  says  the  New  York  Mail  and 
Express: 

We've  met  with  many  men  from  over  seas, 

An'  some  of  'em  was  shy  an'  some  was  not. 
The  Frenchman  and  the  German  and  Chinese, 

But  Kipling  was  the  hardest  of  the  lot. 
Some  of  'em  talked  in  English  an'  the  rest 
Would  talk  from  early  winter  to  the  fall, 
But  the  Mowgli-man  we  found  the  greatest  pest. 
For  the  bloomin'  sod  'e  wouldn't  talk  at  all. 
Still,  'ere's  to  you,  Rudyard  Kipling,  you  es- 
cape our  anger's  ban, 

You're  a  cold,  concentered  Briton,  but  a  first- 
class  writin'  man. 
Although  you  need  to  thaw  a  bit,  to  you  we 

must  be  fair. 

You  are  the  master-writer,  though  you  didn't 
treat  us  square. 

38 


KIPLING  THE  MAN. 

'E  'asn't  got  no  paper  of  his  own, 

An'  so  with  us  'e  doesn't  sympathize, 
Yet  we  can  certify  the  skill  'e's  shown 

In  'andlin'  literary  merchandise. 
If  'e'd  only  start  'is  Fuzzy- Wuzzy  gush, 

And  cast  loose  'is  Anglo-Hindu  talkin'  gear, 
An  'appy  day  with  Rudyard  on  the  rush 

Would  last  an  'ealthy  journalist  a  year. 

Then  'ere'sto  you,  Rudyard  Kipling,  an'  ye're 

welcome  to  the  town, 
You  are  a  prince  of  writing-men,  although  you 

turn  us  down. 
We  give  you  your  certificate  an'  if  you  want  it 

signed, 
We'll  come  an'  'ave  a  chin  with  you  when  you 

are  more  inclined. 

Mr.  Kipling  shuns  publicity  and 
observation.  As  a  literary  lion  he 
seldom  ventures  from  his  lair,  and 
declines  always  to  be  lionized.  In  Eng- 
land he  has  lived  in  retirement,  pro- 
tected himself  against  interruption  of 
labor,  avoided  social  distractions,  and 
seldom  is  seen  in  London.  When  his 
presence  has  been  secured  as  a  drawing 
card  for  a  luncheon  or  a  dinner,  he  has 
39 


A  KEN  OF  KIPLING. 

come  late  and  gone  early,  and  has 
seemed  indifferent  to  the  interest  taken 
in  him.  Reserve  and  seclusiveness  are 
his  characteristic  traits. 

Versatility  is  the  one  marvel  of  the 
man  and  his  work.  As  Shakespeare 
knew  the  science  of  expression  and 
possessed  a  wondrous  mastery  over 
mere  words,  so  Mr.  Kipling  knows 
men,  animals,  and  inanimate  things. 
Nothing  seems  ever  to  escape  his  far- 
seeing,  deep-searching  eyes — and  even 
then  he  looks  through  glasses.  Some 
writer  has  truly  said:  "He  is  a  man 
who  sees  more  with  the  same  number 
of  eyes,  hears  more  with  the  ordinary 
complement  of  ears,  than  any  Anglo- 
Saxon  mortal  has  ever  seen  or  heard  or 
been  able  to  express  before." 

He  is  the  one  writer  of  English  at 
the  present  moment  who  satisfies  quite 

fully  the  two  great  classes  of  readers 
40 


KIPLING  THE  MAN. 

— the  multitude,  on  the  one  hand,  who 
read  to  be  amused;  and  the  cultured 
minority,  who  read  for  art's  sake. 

Devoted  to  his  home  life,  domestic  in 
tastes,  simple  in  his  habits,  regular  and 
systematic  in  his  work,  Mr.  Kipling  is 
a  quiet,  industrious,  unobtrusive  man, 
deeply  in  earnest.  In  his  movements 
he  is  quick  and  lively,  and,  perhaps, 
somewhat  nervous;  and  has  a  thor- 
oughly southern  temperament.  Dis- 
trustful as  he  is  about  himself,  he  is 
without  bounds  in  his  recognition  of 
others.  Sir  Edward  Russell  has  de- 
scribed him  as  a  "  practical,  spruce,  ath- 
letic, well-groomed,  little  figure — mak- 
ing a  splendid  living — not  an  Amos  or 
an  Isaiah." 


II. 

HIS  WORK  IN  PROSE  AND  VERSE. 

WHEN  Mr.  Kipling  first  emerged 
from  his  native  jungles  and  threw  his 
new  bright  light  on  the  civilization  of 
England  and  America,  the  Puritans  of 
literature  were  momentarily  shocked. 
This  young  man  from  far  away  Lahore 
was  neither  Christian  nor  Oriental,  nor 
again  Occidental.  His  was  not  the  po- 
lite literature  of  the  drawing-room,  nor 
the  sestheticism  of  the  studio;  rather 
he  reeked  of  the  army  canteen,  he  gave 
Letters  an  odor  of  horse  and  stable; 
there  was  too  much  of  beer  and  too 
much  of  barracks  and  bar-room  in  his 
verse  and  in  his  prose. 

The  old  bookworms,  the  classic  col- 
42 


HIS  WORK  IN  PROSE  AND  VERSE. 

lege  mummies,  and  the  prim  old  maid- 
ens who  wrote  sonnets  and  went  about 
the  land  organizing  Browning  clubs, 
declared  Mr.  Kipling's  only  aim  was  to 
write  something  that  would  "take" 
with  the  English  people,  and  he  would 
not  last.  "  His  characterization  was 
never  excellent,  often  mediocre,  and 
sometimes  abominable."  "The  tone" 
of  his  work  "offended."  It  "testified 
to  the  chaos  of  an  undisciplined  soul," 
and  thus  on,  to  the  end  of  the  weekly 
reviews. 

In  a  remarkably  short  while  Mr. 
Kipling  was  not  only  universally  read, 
but  became  a  "fad,"  and  the  crit- 
ics, alarmed  unconsciously  perhaps,  at- 
tempted to  ridicule  rather  than  to  be 
harsh;  and  I  cannot  refrain  from  re- 
peating the  plaint  of  the  Cambridge 
parodist,  who  longed  in  desperation 
for — 

43 


A  KEN  OF  KIPLING. 

"That  far  distant  shore 

Where  there  stands  a  muzzled  stripling 
Mute  beside  a  muzzled  bore, 

Where  the  Rudyards  cease  from  Kipling, 
And  the  Haggards  Ride  no  more. " 

As  is  usual,  after  ridicule  came  rec- 
ognition, and  the  critics  accepted  him 
as  a  man  of  letters,  and  all  too  reluc- 
tantly bade  him  "  sit  down  "  and  make 
himself  at  home  among  them.  When 
they  read  his  prose  work,  they  were 
at  first  bewildered;  they  read  him 
twice,  and  marvelled;  thrice,  and  they 
admired.  When  they  were  told  how 
a  "  tattered,  rotten  punkah  of  white- 
washed calico  puddles  the  hot  air  and 
whines  dolefully  at  each  stroke,"  they 
were  at  once  choked  and  stifled  and 
were  oppressed  by  a  hundred  or  more 
degrees  of  Bombay  heat ;  or  when  they 
read  how  "  the  last  puff  of  the  day  wind 
brings  from  the  unseen  villages  the 
scent  of  damp  wood  smoke,  hot  cakes, 
44 


HIS  WORK  IN  PROSE  AND  VERSE. 

dripping  undergrowth,  and  rotting 
pine-cones,"  they  at  once  sniffed  the 
true  atmosphere  of  the  Himalaya  val- 
leys; and  when  "the  witchery  of  the 
dawn  turns  the  gray  river-reaches  to 
purple,  gold,  and  opal,"  they  felt 
as  though  "the  lumbering  dhoni 
crept  across  the  splendors  of  a  new 
heaven." 

The  world  soon  knew  them,  each 
and  every  one — Mulvaney  and  Dormer, 
and  other  privates  in  the  ranks,  Dinah 
Shadd,  and  Lieutenant  Brazenose, 
George  Porgie,  Wee  Willie  Winkie, 
Bobby  Wick,  and  the  troop  of  Indians, 
Ala  Yar,  Jiwun  Singh,  Morrowbie 
Jukes,  Imray  Sahib,  little  Muhamid 
Din,  and  all  the  others. 

Geographies  and  encyclopaedias  and 

dusty    old    tomes    from    the     British 

Museum   were   sought  for  new  notes 

on  Simla,   Lahore,  Calcutta,   Bombay, 

45 


A  KEN  OF  KIPLING. 

Chubari,  Benares,  Irriwaddy,  Lung- 
tungpen,  and  more  of  them  a  score. 

Yet  even  in  the  midst  of  their  admi- 
ration, when  they  read  of  Gunga  Din, 
"the  finest  man  I  ever  knew,"  they 
were  shocked  once  again  to  find  him : 

"Squattin'  on  the  coals, 
Givin'  drink  to  poor  damned  souls." 

and  the  British  big-wigs  surely  must 
have  thrown  a  few  fits  when  they  read : 
"  '  The  Government  should  teach  us  to 
pull  the  triggers  with  our  toes,'  said 
Suket  Singh  grimly  to  the  moon. 
That  was  the  last  public  observation  of 
Sepoy  Suket  Singh." 

Mr.  Kipling  was  compelled  to  go  out 
into  the  world  and  find  his  audience. 
Once  he  found  it,  he  was  forced  to  edu- 
cate his  audience  by  brute  force ;  and 
then  the  literary  epicures  placed  him, 

well  labelled,  among  the  olives,  and  he 
46 


HIS  WORK  IN  PROSE  AND  VERSE. 

became  "an  acquired  taste."  To-day 
the  supply  does  not  equal  the  demand. 

In  the  preface  to  "  Life's  Handicap," 
Mr.  Kipling  relates  the  advice  he  re- 
ceived from  Gobind,  a  holy  man  in  the 
Chubari:  "God  kas  made  very  many 
heads,  but  there  is  only  one  heart  in 
all  the  world  among  your  people  or  my 
people.  They  are  children  in  the  mat- 
ter of  tales.  .  .  .  Tell  them  first  of 
those  things  that  thou  hast  seen,  then 
what  thou  hast  heard,  and,  since  they 
be  children,  tell  them  of  battles  and 
kings,  horses,  devils,  elephants,  and 
angels;  but  omit  not  to  tell  them 
of  love  and  such  like. " 

A  vast  deal  of  the  material  for  his 
early  work  was  gathered  during  spare 
hours,  while  he  was  engaged  in  jour- 
nalism in  India,  and  the  result  justifies 
the  statement  of  a  friend,  that  Kip- 
ling's memory  is  "  so  marvellous  that 
47 


A  KEN  OF  KIPLING. 

a  character  or  a  phrase  or  situation  or 
idea,  appealing  to  him,  is  forever  after 
in  his  possession,  ready  on  tap  for  lit- 
erary exploitation."  He  says  himself 
that  his  tales  were  collected  "  from  all 
places  and  all  sorts  of  people — from 
priests  in  the  Chubari,  from  Ala  Yar 
the  carver,  Jiwun  Singh  the  carpenter, 
nameless  men  in  steamers  and  trains 
round  the  world,  women  spinning  out- 
side their  cottages  in  the  twilight,  offi- 
cers and  gentlemen  now  dead  and  bur- 
ied, and  a  few — but  these  are  the  best 
— my  father  gave  me." 

There  is  much  in  method.  Mr.  Kip- 
ling declares,  for  each  story  he  permits 
to  reach  the  public  eye,  six  other  sto- 
ries are  thrown  bravely  and  resolutely 
into  his  waste-basket.  "  It  is  not  what 
you  write,"  he  says,  "but  when";  and 
he  declares  that  "  all  thought  is  abor- 
tive speech,"  and  that  "we  write  in 
48 


HIS  WORK  IN  PROSE  AND  VERSE. 

letters  of  the  alphabet,  but,  psychologi- 
cally regarded,  every  printed  page  is  a 
picture  book;  every  word,  concrete  or 
abstract,  is  a  picture.  The  picture  it- 
self may  never  come  to  the  reader's 
consciousness,  but  deep  down  below 
in  the  unconscious  realms  the  picture 
works  and  influences  us." 

Englished  and  Americanized,  the 
barrack-room  balladist  and  the  Hindu 
tale  spinner  soon  developed  his  dor- 
mant powers,  and  displayed  his  quick 
and  ready  handling  of  New  York  and 
London  scenes  and  incidents.  Chica- 
go became  as  familiar  to  his  pen  as  Al- 
lahabad. The  Vermont  horse  yielded 
as  readily  to  his  word  of  command  as 
the  mowgli. 

The  American  being  of  a  race  of  a 
variegated  and  commingled  ancestry, 
his  language  is  therefore  not  a  lan- 
guage at  all — rather  is  what  Mr.  Kip- 
4  49 


A  KEN  OF  KIPLING. 

ling  says  it  is,  and  he  is  quite  right 
when  he  declares :  "  The  American  has 
no  language.  He  is  dialect,  slang, 
provincialism,  accent,  and  so  forth." 

"  Mr.  Kipling  can  now  speak  in  many 
different  dialects, "  says  a  captious  crit- 
ic; ."he  can  imitate  any  one  from  a 
Hindu  to  a  New  England  farmer; 
more  than  that,  he  can  actually  differ- 
entiate between  the  various  patois  of 
the  same  country.  He  will  confront 
you  almost  simultaneously  with  the 
Kansas  farmer,  the  Kentucky  horse- 
dealer,  the  Bowery  street  arab,  and 
the  cottager  from  Vermont.  There 
are  five  or  six  distinct  voices,  and  you 
can  tell  at  once  what  each  is  meant 
to  represent,  even  though  you  see  only 
Rudyard  Kipling  all  the  time." 

Away  up  among  the  pine-trees  of 
Maine,  there  lives  a  critic— even  unto 
Maine  a  critic  shall  be  given — and  he 
5° 


HIS  WORK  IN  PROSE  AND  VERSE. 

speaks  in  no  stinted  words  of  praise 
when  he  says  of  Kipling's  later  work: 
"  What  impresses  one  is  the  wonderful 
prodigality  of  his  genius,  his  world- 
wide sympathy,  and  his  tireless  imagi- 
nation. To  the  ordinary  story  writer, 
who  strikes  here  and  there  a  keynote 
of  human  nature,  and  occasionally 
stumbles  into  a  neatly  turned  phrase, 
Mr.  Kipling  shines  as  a  god  to  a  pigmy. 
There  seems  to  be  no  end  to  his  appre- 
ciation of  the  human  animal,  and,  in- 
deed, to  his  sympathy  with  the  inani- 
mate object,  in  whose  depravity  most 
of  us  have  unflinchingly  believed." 

Mr.  Charles  Townsend  Copeland,  a 
professor  at  Harvard  University,  un- 
dertook once  to  wreck  the  Kipling  idol 
and  pulverize  beneath  his  classical  heel 
what  the  world  desired  most  to  wor- 
ship. But  even  Mr.  Copeland  was  just 
enough  to  say  of  the  man  he  sought  to 
51 


A  KEN  OF  KIPLING. 

destroy:  "Kipling  can  write  not  only 
poetry,  but  prose  in  any  dialect  and 
language,  putting  speech  into  the 
mouths  of  horses,  engines,  and  the  ani- 
mals of  the  jungle.  Language  is  a 
thing  over  which  he  has  every  control. " 
"Genius  is  rare,"  says  a  reviewer  in 
a  public  print.  "  Genius  combined  with 
versatility  and  sympathy  is  more  rare 
still.  Think  for  a  moment  of  what  this 
man  has  written.  Note  the  difference 
in  idea,  local  color,  and  treatment  of 
theme,  between  'The  Light  that 
Failed '  and  *  Captains  Courageous. ' 
Is  it  not  a  wide-ranged,  sweeping  tal- 
ent that  can  produce  *  Barrack-Room 
Ballads,'  'Soldiers  Three,'  and  the 
'  Recessional '  ?  Is  it  not  a  wonderful- 
ly sympathetic  touch  that  he  puts  into 
his  stories  of  child  life,  such  as  '  Wee 
Willie  Winkie  '  ?  Then  this  marvel- 
lous man  turns  completely  round  and 
52 


HIS  WORK  IN  PROSE  AND  VERSE. 

writes  the  '  Jungle  Stories '  and  '  The 
Story  of  the  Gadsbys  '  ;  and  before  one 
is  done  wondering  if  his  talent  has  no 
end,  he  comes  out  with  his  '  Slaves 
of  the  Lamp '  and  '  The  Day's  Work. '  " 

A  critic  who  carefully  analyzed  the 
stories  contained  in  the  volume  "  The 
Day's  Work,"  comes  to  this  conclusion: 
"  Mr.  Kipling  stands  so  far  incompar- 
able as  the  master  of  romance ;  he  has 
found  for  us  the  latest  view  of  rail  and 
screw,  bolt  and  valve.  He  gave  us  es- 
cape from  an  atmosphere  which  was 
growing  perhaps  oppressively  rich  for 
the  natural  man;  he  took  us  out  of 
doors,  into  the  souse  of  the  sea  spray, 
within  sound  of  the  piston's  tramp." 

"  No  living  writer,"  writes  an  admir- 
er, "  can  equal  the  power  Kipling  pos- 
sesses to  present  types  from  widely  di- 
verse but  contemporaneous  civilization 
with  such  striking  artistic  effect;  his 
53 


A  KEN  OF  KIPLING. 

perception  of  the  real  nature  of  each  is 
profound  and  accurate.  His  prepon- 
derant characteristic  is  his  incisive 
manner  of  getting  at  the  very  heart  of 
things,  and  then  his  picturesque  power 
of  making  the  reader  see  clearly  just 
what  he  himself  sees.  His  wonderful 
imagination  and  originality  is  empha- 
sized by  a  style  that  is  stately  and 
cheerful,  and  a  precision  of  diction  that 
always  seems  to  choose  the  right  word." 
The  intelligent  usage  of  technical 
terms  in  the  literary  sense  has  become 
a  second  nature  with  him,  and  this 
characteristic  utilization  of  words  and 
phrases,  popular  heretofore  only  with 
the  artisan  and  the  laborer,  has  added  a 
charm  to  his  writings,  which  is  becom- 
ing better  understood  by  the  great 
mass  of  readers.  In  his  book,  "A 
Fleet  in  Being,"  he  confines  his 
sketches  of  character  to  the  marine 
54 


HIS  WORK  IN  PROSE  AND  VERSE. 

and  the  stoker  on  board  a  man-of-war, 
and  these  pen  pictures  to  the  eyes  of  the 
landsman  are  delightfully  refreshing.  * 
Mr.  Kipling  stands  to-day  the  one 
writer  of  English  who  is  proof  against 
criticism — in  the  sense  of  the  criticism 
doing  injury  to  his  reputation.  His 
followers  are  legion,  and  they  resent 
even  to  bitterness  any  attempt  to  belit- 
tle his  creations.  He  has  shown  him- 
self a  master  of  verse  and  a  master  of 
prose.  He  could  perhaps  be  a  master 
dramatist,  and  the  world  has  marvelled 
that  he  has  never  undertaken  a  play. 
However,  Mr.  Kipling  is  a  man  of 
sense  and  forethought,  and  it  is  not  un- 
likely that  he  sees  in  playwriting  the 
great  and  dangerous  risk  of  failure. 
And  why  should  he  take  us  before  the 
footlights  ?  The  public  satisfaction 
would  be  only  temporary,  and  soon 
would  we  be  calling: 
55 


A  KEN  OF  KIPLING. 

"  Come  you  back  to  Mandalay, 
Where  the  old  flotilla  lay ; 
Can't  you  'ear  their  paddles  chunkin'  from 
Rangoon  to  Mandalay  ? 
On  the  road  to  Mandalay, 
Where  the  fly  in'  fishes  play, 
An'  the  dawn  comes  up  like  thunder  outer 
China  'crost  the  bay." 


III. 

POEMS  FOR  A  PURPOSE. 

THE  awakening  of  the  English  peo- 
ple to  the  realization  that  Mr.  Kipling 
was  something  more  than  an  army  bal- 
lad singer  and  a  story  teller  was 
brought  about  by  the  publication  of 
four  poems — "The  Vampire,"  "Our 
Lady  of  the  Snows,"  "The  Reces- 
sional," and  "The  Truce  of  the  Bear." 

"  The  Recessional "  was  at  once  con- 
sidered throughout  the  English-speak- 
ing world  as  one  of  the  chief  religious 
events  of  the  decade.  It  awoke  an 
international  consciousness,  and  ex- 
pressed the  theology  of  the  old-fash- 
ioned English  faith.  The  whole  world 
57 


A  KEN  OF  KIPLING. 

seemed  to  respond  and  agree  with  Mr. 
Kipling  that  "  we  are  neither  children 
nor  gods,  but  men  in  a  world  of  men." 
The  verses  made  the  English  people 
realize  that  a  religion  of  humanity  was 
being  preached  rather  than  a  religion 
of  philosophy. 

The  Kipling  poem  first  to  attract  the 
attention  of  all  classes  was  undoubtedly 
"The  Vampire."  It  was  written  in 
1897,  to  accompany  a  picture  by  Philip 
Burne-Jones,  the  English  artist.  Pic- 
ture and  poem  are  called  "  The  Vam- 
pire." The  poem  was  printed  in 
the  London  Daily  Mail,  in  April, 
1897,  as  follows: 

THE  VAMPIRE. 

A  fool  there  was  and  he  made  his  prayer 

(Even  as  you  and  I !) 
To  a  rag  and  a  bone  and  a  hank  of  hair 
(We  called  her  the  woman  who  did  not  care) , 
But  the  fool  he  called  her  his  lady  fair 

(Even  as  you  and  I !) 
58 


POEMS  FOR  A  PURPOSE. 

Oh,  the  years  ive  waste  and  the  tears  toe  waste 

And  the  work  of  our  head  and  hand 
Belong  to  the  woman  who  did  not  know 
(And  now  we  know  that  she  never  could  know) 
And  did  not  understand 

A  fool  there  was  and  his  goods  he  spent 

(Even  as  you  and  I !) 
Honor  and  faith  and  a  sure  intent 
(And  it  wasn't  the  least  what  the  lady  meant). 
But  a  fool  must  follow  his  natural  bent 

(Even  as  you  and  I !) 

Oh,  the  toil  we  lost  and  the  spoil  we  lost 

And  the  excellent  things  we  planned, 
Belong  to  the  woman  who  didn't  know  why 
(And  now  we  know  that  she  never  knew  why) 
And  did  not  understand. 

The  fool  was  stripped  to  his  foolish  hide 

(Even  as  you  and  I !) 
Which  she  might  have  seen  when  she  threw 

him  aside— 

(But  it  isn't  on  record  the  lady  tried) 
So  some  of  him  lived  but  the  most  of  him  died — 

(Even  as  you  and  I !) 

And  it  isn't  the  shame  and  it  isn't  the  blame 

That  stings  like  a  white-hot  brand- 
It's  coming  to  know  that  she  never  knew  why 
(Seeing  at  last  she  could  never  know  why) 
And  never  could  understand. 
59 


A  KEN  OF  KIPLING. 

His  famous  contribution  to  the  poe- 
try of  the  Queen's  jubilee  appeared 
in  the  Times  of  London  originally,  and 
has  since  been  reprinted  in  every  form 
and  manner  of  the  art  typographic. 
However  well  "  The  Recessional "  may 
be  known,  I  am  compelled,  if  only  by  a 
sense  of  duty,  to  reprint  the  verses 
here,  lest  we  forget : 

RECESSIONAL. 

God  of  our  fathers,  known  of  all — 

Lord  of  our  far-flung  battle-line — 
Beneath  whose  awful  Hand  we  hold 

Dominion  over  palm  and  pine- 
Lord  God  of  Hosts,  be  with  us  yet. 
Lest  we  forget — lest  we  forget ! 

The  tumult  and  the  shouting  dies'— 
The  captains  and  the  kings  depart. 

Still  stands  Thine  ancient  Sacrifice, 
An  humble  and  a  contrite  heart. 

Lord  God  of  Hosts,  be  with  us  yet, 

Lest  we  forget — lest  we  forget ! 

Far-called  our  navies  melt  away — 
On  dune  and  headland  sinks  the  fire— 
60 


POEMS  FOR  A  PURPOSE. 

Lo,  all  our  pomp  of  yesterday 

Is  one  with  Nineveh  and  Tyre ! 
Judge  of  the  Nations,  spare  us  yet, 
Lest  we  forget— lest  we  forget ! 

If,  drunk  with  sight  of  power,  we  loose 

Wild  tongues  that  have  not  Thee  in  awe- 
Such  boasting  as  the  Gentiles  use 

Or  lesser  breeds  without  the  Law- 
Lord  God  of  Hosts,  be  with  us  yet, 
Lest  we  forget— lest  we  forget ! 

For  heathen  heart  that  puts  her  trust 

In  reeking  tube  and  iron  shard — 
All  valiant  dust  that  builds  on  dust, 

And  guarding  calls  not  Thee  to  guard— 
For  frantic  boast  and  foolish  word, 
Thy  Mercy  on  Thy  People.  Lord ! 
AMEN. 

Mr.  Kipling  thus  describes  how  he 
came  to  write  "  The  Recessional "  : 
"That  poem  gave  me  more  trouble 
than  anything  I  ever  wrote.  I  had 
promised  the  Times  a  poem  on  the  Ju- 
bilee, and  when  it  became  due  I  had 
written  nothing  that  had  satisfied  me. 

The  Times  began  to  want  that  poem 
61 


A  KEN  OF  KIPLING. 

badly,  and  sent  letter  after  letter  asking 
for  it.  I  made  many  more  attempts, 
but  no  further  progress.  Finally  the 
Times  began  sending  telegrams.  So  I 
shut  myself  in  a  room  with  the  deter- 
mination to  stay  there  until  I  had  writ- 
ten a  Jubilee  poem.  Sitting  down  with 
all  my  previous  attempts  before  me, 
I  searched  through  those  dozens  of 
sketches,  till  at  last  I  found  just  one 
line  I  liked.  That  was  *  Lest  we  forget. ' 
Round  these  words  '  The  Recessional ' 
was  written." 

Of  the  Jubilee  ode,  "  Lest  We  For- 
get," no  less  a  critic  than  Sir  Edward 
Russell  has  said :  "  I  remember  how  it 
seized  me  when  it  appeared;  how  it 
startled  all  the  world ;  how  it  was  just 
what  was  wanted  —  just  the  cogent, 
lyrical,  rhythmical  appeal  to  con- 
cience  called  for  by  a  certain  almost 

debauch  of  national  sentiment,  quite 
62 


POEMS  FOR  A  PURPOSE. 

excusable,    but     become     very     flatu- 
lent." 

Mr.  James  Lane  Allen  asserts  that 
"  The  Recessional "  is  "  probably  Kip- 
ling's noblest  and  most  enduring  poetic 
achievement,"  and  then  follows  an 
analysis  of  the  poet's  work:  "  It  is  virile 
— nothing  that  he  ever  wrote  is  more 
so;  yet  is  refined — as  little  else  that  he 
has  ever  written  is.  It  is  strong,  but 
it  is  equally  delicate.  It  is  massive  as 
a  whole;  it  is  in  every  line  just  as 
graceful.  It  is  large  enough  to  comA 
pass  the  scope  of  the  British  empire; 
it  creates  this  immensity  by  the  use  of 
a  few  small  details.  It  may  be  instant- 
ly understood  and  felt  by  all  men  in 
its  obviousness ;  yet  it  is  so  rare  that  he 
alone  of  all  the  millions  of  Englishmen 
could  even  think  of  writing  it.  The 
new,  vast  prayer  of  it  rises  from  the 
ancient  sacrifice  of  a  contrite  heart." 
63 


A  KEN  OF  KIPLING. 

The  world  saw  in  "  The  Recessional " 
the  fearless  expression  of  a  sober,  de- 
vout thought.  It  came  as  a  loud  voice 
crying  from  out  of  a  multitude  of 
voices,  heard  and  recognized  above  the 
babble  of  Fleet  Street,  in  a  time  of 
great  national  rejoicing  among  the 
English  people. 

For  absolute  fearlessness,  vividness, 
and  force,  his  next  poetical  production, 
the  allegorical  poem,  "The  Truce  of 
the  Bear,"  is  beyond  anything  in  our 
language. 

The  poem  at  once  gave  expression 
to  what  had  haunted  many  minds 
after  the  appearance  of  the  Czar's 
proclamation  in  behalf  of  universal 
disarmament.  The  motto  is:  "There 
is  no  truce  with  Adam-zad — the  bear 
that  walks  like  a  man."  Mr.  Kipling 
does  not  hesitate  to  show  his  distrust  of 

the  motive  which  inspired   that  now 
64 


POEMS  FOR  A  PURPOSE. 

famous  document,  and  the  result  is  per- 
haps his  most  important  achievement  in 
poetry.  To  cite  from  the  Czar's  proc- 
lamation : 

"  It  is  the  supreme  duty,  therefore, 
at  the  present  moment,  of  all  states  to 
put  some  limit  to  these  increasing  ar- 
maments, and  to  find  a  means  of  avert- 
ing the  calamities  which  threaten  the 
whole  world.  Impressed  by  this  feel- 
ing, his  majesty,  the  emperor,"  etc. 

Mr.  Kipling  tells  in  his  own  wonder- 
ful way  the  story  of  the  hunter  who 
forbore  to  kill  the  great  bear.  Matun, 
an  old  blind  beggar,  is  in  the  habit  of 
following  the  "  careless  white  men"  as 
they  come  back  at  night  through  the 
Muttianee  Pass  from  their  day's  shoot- 
ing, showing  them  his  horribly  disfig- 
ured face,  and  telling  his  story.  It  is 
the  story  of  a  bear  hunt.  The  bear, 
Adam-zad,  a  prodigy  of  strength  and 
5  65 


A  KEN  OF  KIPLING. 

cunning,  had  been  plundering  Matun's 
goat-pens.  Matun  started  out  after 
him  with  an  old  flintlock  musket,  and 
finally  overtook  him  —  "all  weary  in 
flight."  Adam-zad  reared  up,  bear- 
fashion.  He  looked  almost  human. 
He  put  his  paws  together,  as  if  in  sup- 
plication. Matun  was  moved.  His 
heart  was  "  touched  with  pity  for  the 
monstrous,  pleading  thing."  He 
didn't  fire.  Adam-zad  tottered  nearer 
and  nearer.  Suddenly,  with  one  blow 
of  his  steel-shod  paw,  he  blinded  the 
hesitating,  compassionate  Matun  for 
life.  Then,  grunting  and  chuckling, 
he  shuffled  off  to  his  den.  Matun 
urges  the  careless  white  men  to  avenge 
him  of  his  enemy.  He  adds  a  counsel 
and  a  warning. 

One  would  think,  upon  reading  "  The 
Truce  of  the  Bear,"  that  the  sentiment 

expressed  therein  was  but  an  old-time 
66 


POEMS  FOR  A  PURPOSE. 

prose  Kipling  comment,  set  to  the  mod- 
ern form  of  poesy.  In  his  earlier  days, 
in  his  short  story  of  "  The  Man  Who 
Was,"  he  wrote:  "Let  it  be  distinctly 
understood  that  the  Russian  is  a  de- 
lightful person  till  he  tucks  in  his  shirt. " 
"  As  long  ago  as  that, "  comments  a 
writer  in  the  New  York  Post,  "  he  was 
full  of  the  idea  of  the  Russians  coming 
down  through  the  Khyber  Pass,  and  of 
the  '  terrible  spree '  there  would  be 
when  the  British  met  them.  They 
were  splendid  fellows,  those  Russians, 
so  long  as  it  was  only  a  question  of 
fighting  them  like  so  many  nomad  Tar- 
tars; but  when  they  set  up  for  civil- 
ized Europeans,  they  became  simply 
disgusting  hypocrites.  It  is  because 
the  Czar  has  not  only  tucked  in  his  own 
shirt,  but  asked  the  nations  each  to 
tuck  in  its  own,  that  he  loses  all  his 

charm  for  Mr.  Kipling. " 
67 


A  KEN  OF  KIPLING. 

A  Chicago  bookish-man  protested, 
and  said  it  was  absurd  to  find  an  alle- 
gorical meaning  in  "  The  Truce  of  the 
Bear."  "Any  bear  hunter,"  wrote  the 
Chicago  philosopher,  "  could  tell  of  the 
feeling  of  pity  experienced  when  a 
bear  about  to  be  shot  assumes  that 
pleading  attitude  and  expression,  little 
less  than  human,  by  raising  upon  its 
hind  legs  with  unlifted  paws,  and  tot- 
tering unsteadily  toward  its  foe." 

A  scholarly  person  of  Denver  there- 
upon took  occasion  to  declare  "  that  the 
feeling  that  permeates  a  hunter's  breast 
when  a  bear  rises  upon  its  hind  paws 
and  advances  toward  him  is  not  one  of 
pity,  but  an  irresistible  desire  to  close 
the  interview  and  hit  only  the  high 
places  in  the  landscape  in  retiring  from 
the  scene." 

"The  White  Man's  Burden,"  a  still 

later  poem  for  a  purpose,  was  written 
68 


POEMS  FOR  A  PURPOSE. 

for  the  American,  as  "  The  Recession- 
al" was  written  for  the  Englishman. 
The  title  of  these  political  verses  was 
undoubtedly  called  forth  by  the  expan- 
sion policy  of  the  United  States,  forced 
upon  the  Government  through  the 
somewhat  unexpected  results  of  the 
Spanish- American  war.  Mr.  Kipling's 
lines : 

"Your  new-caught  sullen  peoples 
Half  devil  and  half  child," 

are  supposedly  descriptive  of  the  Fili- 
pinos. The  poet  evidently  seeks  to  re- 
mind the  American  people  of  a  duty 
to  be  performed,  hence  admonition  and 
advice.  He  may  speak  as  one  with 
authority  in  directing  the  American, 
for  no  one  in  the  United  States  knows 
the  character  Asiatic  quite  so  well  as 
Rudyard  Kipling. 

In  a  sense,  Mr.  Kipling  in  this  poem 

has  outczared  the  Czar.     The  greatest 
69 


A  KEN  OF  KIPLING. 

of  the  Russians  advocated  the  disarma- 
ment of  the  nations  as  a  means  of  pro- 
moting universal  peace.  Mr.  Kipling 
believes  it  is  the  grave  duty  incumbent 
on  the  white  man  to  carry  his  civiliza- 
tion to  the  remote  peoples  and  distant 
regions  of  the  earth. 

The  world,  once  civilized,  would  no 
longer  war,  there  being  no  more  wild 
races  of  men  to  conquer  and  control,  no 
vast  areas  of  land  to  seize  and  hold 
under  an  excuse  of  civilizing.  Mr. 
Kipling  declares  with  no  uncertain 
voice  that  the  "burden  of  the  white 
man  "  is  to  civilize  the  world,  develop 
its  neglected  resources,  and  build  up 
waste  places.  The  white  men  of  so 
great  and  so  advanced  a  nation  as  the 
United  States  cannot  shirk  their  share 
of  the  world's  burden.  In  truth,  the 
"American  Recessional"  is  a  poem 

written  for  a  purpose. 
70 


TV. 

KIPLING'S  RELIGION. 

THE  publication  of  "  The  Recession- 
al "  gave  the  religious  element  of  the 
English-speaking  people  a  new  and 
clearer  view  of  Mr.  Kipling,  both  as  a 
man  and  as  a  poet.  When  the  world 
read  his  immortal  lines: 

"God  of  our  fathers,  known  of  all- 
Lord  of  our  far-flung  battle -line — 

**  Lord  God  of  Hosts,  be  with  us  yet, 
Lest  we  forget — lest  we  forget," 

the  words  of  a  prayer  at  once  became 
impressed  upon  the  mind.     To  Ameri- 
cans, the  lines    recalled  those  sacred 
words  of  Dr.  S.  Weir  Mitchell: 
7* 


A  KEN  OF  KIPLING. 

"Almighty  God,  eternal  source 

Of  every  arm  we  dare  to  wield, 
Be  thine  the  thanks,  as  Thine  the  force, 
On  reeling  deck  or  stricken  field." 

The  churchman  read  again  his 
Psalms,  and  the  words  of  David  of  old 
burned  upon  the  memory  of  the  right- 
eous: 

"Oh  God,  thou  God  of  my  salvation  .  .  . 
Hear,  O  my  people,  and  I  will  speak  .  .  . 
Mine  enemies  .  .  .  slay  them  not,  lest  my 
people  forget.  .  .  .  O,  Lord  of  Hosts,  my 
King  and  my  God." 

The  strong,  manly  touch  of  piety 
and  reverence  in  Mr.  Kipling's  later 
verse  gives  us  in  a  way  the  well- 
remembered  devoutness  of  Luther 
and  of  Milton,  and  at  least  the  sincer- 
ity of  Wordsworth,  Browning,  and 
Tennyson. 

In  his  earlier  work,  particularly  in 
the  "Soldiers  Three,"  Mr.  Kipling, 
with  the  same  sense  of  piety,  wrote  in 

his  introduction: 

72 


KIPLING'S  RELIGION. 

"I  lift  the  cloth  that  cloaks  the  clay, 
And,  wearied,  at  Thy  feet  I  lay 

My  wares  ere  I  go  forth  to  sell. 
The  long  bazar  will  praise— but  Thou — 

Heart  of  my  heart,  have  I  done  well?" 

and  three  years  later,  in  "  Life's  Handi- 
cap, "  this  prayerful  tone  appeared : 

"  By  my  own  work  before  the  night, 
Great  Overseer,  I  make  my  prayer. 

If  there  be  good  in  that  I  wrought, 
Thy  hand  compelled  it,  Master,  Thine : 
Where  I  have  failed  to  meet  Thy  thought, 
I  know,  through  Thee,  the  blame  is  mine." 

There  is  more  of  a  personal,  abstract 
view  of  religion  in  Mr.  Kipling's  verse 
than  an  old,  established  faith,  bound  by 
ritual  and  tradition.  Mr.  Kipling's  re- 
ligion is  the  religion  of  to-day — the  re- 
ligion of  Charles  Dickens,  of  a  broad 
and  expansive  humanity.  "  His  reli- 
gion," says  an  essayist  in  the  New 
World)  "  is  not  only  human,  but  almost 
exclusively  masculine.  It  does  not  be- 
73 


A  KEN  OF  KIPLING. 

long  to  saints,  neither  does  it  belong 
to  women,  but  to  unchastened,  faulty 
men — to  Dick  Heldar,  McAndrews,  Sir 
Anthony  Gloster,  and  Mulvaney.  Mas- 
culine they  are  to  the  core,  like  primi- 
tive heroes,  with  the  wander-fever  in 
their  blood,  the  venture-light  in  their 
eyes,  in  their  ears  the  roar  of  breakers 
and  of  big  guns,  in  their  nostrils  the 
odors  of  the  mossy  Himalaya  forests 
and  the  spices  of  Mandalay  to  lure 
them  out  from  comforts  and  shelter. 
The  religion  of  such  men  is  short  and 
swiftly  told.  A  simple  religion,  as 
simple  as  that  of  the  primitive  heroes 
— of  Ulysses,  of  Sidney,  and  stout  Sir 
Richard  Grenville.  Two  words  would 
hold  it  all — courage  and  toil :  courage, 
the  merry  daring  that  laughs  the  world 
to  scorn;  toil,  the  quenchless  effort 
to  make  the  world  obey.  They  who 
forged  this  faith  surely  took  counsel  of 
74 


KIPLING'S  RELIGION. 

the  world's  prophets — of  Joshua  and 
St.  Paul:  of  Joshua  for  the  first  of  it, 
'  Be  not  afraid,  neither  be  ye  dis- 
mayed '  ;  and  St.  Paul  for  the  second, 
'  Endure  hardness  like  a  good  soldier. ' 
'  Do  your  work  and  fear  nothing ' — this 
is  the  gospel  Mr.  Kipling  has  ever 
preached,  and  he  has  preached  it  con- 
sistently." 

His  hymns  are  those  of  the  bold  and 
unlearned  warrior — not  the  hymns  of 
the  cloistered  student.  In  his  poetic 
prayers  to  the  God  of  All  there  is  "  no 
argument,  no  formal  and  ordered  reli- 
gion of  the  head,  but  a  religion  of  the 
heart  and  viscera — out  of  the  bowels  of 
men  in  great  conflict  and  great  con- 
quest, with  the  sweat  and  blood  of  grim 
primal  struggle  on  their  foces,  and  the 
words  of  inevitable  need  and  dire  hon- 
esty on  their  lips. " 

The  same  religion  of  humanity  may 
75 


A  KEN  OF  KIPLING. 

be  found  in  Kipling's  prose  work,  as 
well  as  in  his  hymns  and  poems.  Only 
for  the  reason  of  the  devout  aspect  of 
"  The  Recessional "  were  we  reminded 
of  his  vein  of  religious  feeling.  In  his 
"  Drums  of  the  Fore  and  Aft,"  there  is 
much  of  this  Christian  humanity  of  the 
age  Lin  which  we  live,  as  when  our  au- 
thor says: 

"  God  has  arranged  that  a  clean-run 
youth  of  the  British  middle  classes 
shall,  in  the  matter  of  backbone, 
brains,  and  bowels,  surpass  all  other 
youths. " 

The  religion  of  the  Kipling  heroes — 
of  his  Mulvaneys,  Gadsbys,  and  Strick- 
lands — is  that  of  human  endeavor,  of 
man's  bravery,  and  man's  daring.  His 
heroes  are  not  handicapped  with  long 
rules  of  prayer  and  repentance,  of  per- 
sonal responsibility  to  God,  the  atone- 
ment, forgiveness  of  injuries,  and  the 
76 


KIPLING'S  RELIGION. 

duty  of  showing  mercy.  They  have 
already  the  teachings  of  the  Spirit  in- 
born, the  rudiments  of  creed  a  part  of 
their  daily  work  and  rations.  "This 
religion,"  says  Mr.  W.  B.  Parker, 
"needs  no  interpretation.  They  who 
hold  it  are  not  men  of  speech.  Words 
of  their  faith  are  far  from  their  lips,  as 
often  the  path  of  their  faith  is  far  from 
their  feet;  but  at  sea  or  ashore,  they 
blazon  the  unspoken  creed  in  unmis- 
takable deeds.  Sometimes  it  is  in  a 
revel  of  reckless  adventure  that  makes 
a  boy's  blood  tingle.  Then  at  mid- 
night, and  naked,  they  swim  rivers  and 
take  towns;  they  go  into  battle  like 
devils  possessed  of  devils ;  they  put  out 
in  leaky  hulks  to  '  euchre  God  Al- 
mighty's storm  and  bluff  the  eternal 
sea.'  Sometimes  it  is  in  a  soberer 
mood.  Then  they  show  their  devotion 
to  duty,  as  Bobby  Wicks  does  in  *  Only 
77 


A  KEN  OF  KIPLING. 

a  Subaltern,'  and  as  Hummil  does  at 
*  The  end  of  the  passage. '  Boy  and 
man,  you  will  remember,  both  die ;  the 
one  nursing  an  unamiable  private  in  a 
fever-camp;  the  other,  solitary  in  his 
own  unhealthy  post,  which  he  keeps  to 
save  a  comrade  from  exposure.  All 
this  in  silence,  for  these  men  are  mess- 
mates of  toil  and  death.  Their  religion 
is  one  of  action,  and  yet,  because  they 
have  lived  close  comrades  to  death  and 
felt  their  own  helplessness,  they  have 
learned  to  believe — to  believe  as  their 
fathers  did — in  God  and  heaven  and 
hell." 


V. 

ANECDOTES   OF  KIPLING. 

SELDOM  one  tells  a  joke  on  one's  self; 
not  so,  however,  with  Mr.  Kipling,  who 
relates  an  amusing  story  at  his  own 
expense.  During  his  stay  at  Wiltshire 
one  summer,  he  met  little  Dorothy 
Drew,  Mr.  Gladstone's  granddaughter, 
and  being  very  fond  of  children,  took 
her  in  the  grounds  and  told  her  stories. 
After  a  time,  Mrs.  Drew,  fearing  that 
Mr.  Kipling  must  be  tired  of  the  child, 
called  her  and  said:  "Now,  Dorothy,  I 
hope  you  have  not  been  wearying  Mr. 
Kipling."  "Oh,  not  a  bit,  mother," 
replied  the  small  celebrity;  "but  he 
has  been  wearying  me. " 
79 


A  KEN  OF  KIPLING. 

Mr.  Kipling  wrote  this  reply  to 
James  Whitcomb  Riley,  who  had  sent 
him  a  copy  of  "  Child  World  "  : 

"Your  trail  lies  to  the  westward, 

Mine  back  to  mine  own  place. 
There  is  water  between  our  lodges — 

I  have  not  seen  your  face ; 
But  I  have  read  your  verses, 

And  I  can  guess  the  rest. 
For  in  the  hearts  of  children 

There  is  no  east  or  west. " 


An  English  author  visited  the  nur- 
sery of  a  friend's  house  in  Brighton,  to 
see  the  children.  The  sound  of  his 
step  on  the  stairs  was  hailed  with  a 
shriek  of  delight,  and  the  children 
tumbled  over  each  other  in  their  eager- 
ness to  meet  him.  Then  they  stopped 
short  in  dismay.  "What's  the  mat- 
ter?" he  asked.  "We  fought  it  was 
Mr.  Kipling,"  said  the  youngest,  with 

tears  in  her  voice.     It  appeared  that 
80 


ANECDOTES  OF  KIPLING. 

Mr.  Kipling  was  in  the  habit  of  telling1 
them  stories,  and  they  couldn't  appre- 
ciate any  one  else's  visits.  Mr.  Kipling 
is  very  sympathetic  with  childhood, 
and  is  often  to  be  found  romping  with 

his  own  children. 

#     * 
* 

Miss  Julia  Marlowe,  the  actress, 
lived  one  summer  a  neighbor  to  Mr. 
Kipling  in  Vermont.  At  the  holiday 
season  he  presented  her,  as  a  Christmas 
gift,  one  of  his  books,  with  this  inscrip- 
tion on  the  fly-leaf: 

"  When  skies  are  gray  instead  of  blue, 

With  clouds  that  come  to  dishearten; 
When  things  go  wrong  as  they  sometimes  do 

In  life's  little  kindergarten. 
I  beg  you,  my  child,  don't  weep  and  wail, 

And  don't— don't  take  to  tippling; 
But  cheer  your  soul  with  a  little  tale 

By  Neighbor  Rudyard  Kipling." 

*** 
At  a  small  party  in    England    one 

evening,  a  young  lady  sang  one  of  his 
6  81 


A  KEN  OF  KIPLING. 

"  Barrack- Room  Ballads,"  and  in  the 
heat  of  her  emotion  she  stepped  away 
from  the  piano  and  alighted  on  his  foot. 
She  blushed  and  stammered  an  apol- 
ogy. "Oh,  don't  apologize,"  he  whis- 
pered; "the  corn  was  four  toes  off!  " 


Mr.  Kipling  sent  Capt.  Robley  D. 
Evans,  of  the  warship  Iowa,  a  set  of  his 
works,  and  with  them  these  verses: 

"  Zogbaum  draws  with  a  pencil, 
And  I  do  things  with  a  pen, 
But  you  sit  up  in  a  conning-tower, 
Bossing  eight  hundred  men. 

"  Zogbaum  takes  care  of  his  business, 

And  I  take  care  of  mine, 
But  you  take  care  of  ten  thousand  tons. 
Sky-hooting  through  the  brine. 

"  Zogbaum  can  handle  his  shadows, 

And  I  can  handle  my  style, 
But  you  can  handle  a  ten-inch  gun 
To  carry  seven  mile, 
82 


ANECDOTES  OF  KIPLING. 

"To  him  that  hath  shall  be  given, 

And  that's  why  these  books  are  sent 
To  the  man  who  has  lived  more  stories 
Than  Zogbaum  or  I  could  invent." 

Zogbaum,  I  may  be  permitted  to 
explain,  is  an  artist-author,  beloved 
by  the  navy. 


Now  must  we  spoil  a  Kipling  story. 
The  fable,  ere  ruin  came,  ran  thus: 
Once  upon  a  time,  the  father,  John 
Lockwood  Kipling,  and  his  son,  then 
a  boy,  were  on  a  voyage,  and  the  voy- 
age proved  too  much  for  the  father. 
While  he  was  sick  in  his  cabin,  an  offi- 
cer appeared  and  cried: 

"  Your  son,  Mr.  Kipling,  has  climbed 
out  on  the  foreyard,  and  if  he  lets  go 
he'll  be  drowned ;  we  cannot  save  him. " 

"  Oh,  is  that  all? "  replied  Mr.  Kip- 
ling, turning  his  back  on  the  officer; 
"he  won't  let  go." 

83 


A  KEN  OF  KIPLING. 

A  gentleman  has  been  unkind  enough 
to  ask  the  elder  Kipling  whether  this 
story  was  true.  Mr.  Kipling  replied: 

"  The  only  time  that  I  made  a  voy- 
age with  Rudyard  was  when  he  was 
twelve  years  of  age,  and  that  only  be- 
tween Dover  and  Calais,  going  to  the 
Paris  Exhibition.  I'm  never  sick  at 
sea,  and  on  the  steamer  on  which  we 
crossed  I  do  not  suppose  there  was  a 
bowsprit  or  whatever  they  call  it.  I'm 
very  sorry  to  spoil  the  little  story,  but 
it  never  happened." 


A  New  York  gentleman,  who  for  a 
summer  lived  near  neighbor  to  Mr. 
Kipling  in  Vermont,  tells  this  story :  "  I 
was  walking  down  the  main  street  of 
Brattleboro  one  day,  and  saw  Kipling 
coming  toward  me.  He  was  dressed 
in  a  bicycle  suit,  and  came  swinging 
84 


ANECDOTES  OF  KIPLING. 

along  at  an  easy  gait.  Just  ahead  of 
me  there  was  a  little  Chinese  laundry, 
and  the  Chinaman  was  standing  in  the 
doorway.  When  Kipling  reached  him, 
he  addressed  the  Chinaman  in  Chinese 
and  began  a  rattling  conversation  with 
him  in  that  language.  The  Chinaman 
gave  a  gasp  of  surprise,  but  answered 
him,  and  in  a  few  minutes  Kipling  had 
him  smiling  from  ear  to  ear,  and  both 
of  them  were  jabbering  away  in  Chi- 
nese. I  understood  afterward  that 
every  time  Kipling  came  to  town,  he 
stopped  for  a  chat  with  the  Chinaman. 
The  Celestial  would  never  tell  the  won- 
dering neighbors  what  Kipling  talked 
about,  and  when  he  was  asked  only 
replied:  "Him  welly  fine  man.  Him 
welly  gleat  man." 

*     * 
* 

Mr.     Kipling     is     not     ungracious. 
When  asked  by  the  editor  of  The  Can- 


A  KEN  OF  KIPLING. 

tab,  a  journal  published  by  undergrad- 
uates of  Cambridge,  to  contribute 
something  to  its  pages,  he  returned  this 
genial  reply : 

"THE  ELMS,  ROTTINGDEAN,  NEAR  BRIGHTON, 
"September  i7th,  1898. 

"  To  the  Editor  of  The  Cantab  : 

"There  was  once  a  writer  who  wrote : 
" '  Dear  Sir :  In  reply  to  your  note 
Of  yesterday's  date, 
I  am  sorry  to  state 

It's  no  good  at  the  prices  you  quote. "' 
RUDYARD  KIPLING. 

Thereupon  the  editor  consulted  with 
his  colleagues,  and  the  result  was  a  let- 
ter desiring  to  know  what  were  Mr. 
Kipling's  terms,  and  concluding  thus: 
"  So  long  as  we  have  any  garments  left 
in  our  wardrobes  and  an  obliging  avun- 
cular relative,  we  are  prepared  to  make 
any  sacrifices  to  obtain  some  of  your 
spirited  lines." 

The  author  hastened    to  depreciate 
86 


ANECDOTES  OF  KIPLING. 

such  a  sacrifice  and  introduced  the  fol- 
lowing reply,  with  a  humorous  sketch 
of  his  unknown  correspondents : 

"SEPTEMBER  2gth,  1898. 
"  DEAR  SIR  :  Heaven  forbid  that  the 
staff  of    The   Cantab  should  go   about 
pawning  their  raiment  in  a  public-spir- 
ited attempt  to  secure  a  contribution 
from  my  pen !     The  fact  is  that  I  can't 
do  things  to  order  with  any  satisfaction 
to   myself  or  the    buyer;     otherwise, 
would  have  sent  you  something. 
"  Sincerely, 

"RUDYARD  KIPLING." 

Not  yet  satisfied,  the  young  colle- 
gians begged  for  a  photograph,  and  had 
for  an  answer  this : 

"  As  to  photos  of  myself,  I  have  not 
one  by  me  at  present,  but  when  I  find 
one  I  will  send  it ;  but  not  for  publica- 
tion, because  my  beauty  is  such  that  it 
fades  like  a  flower  if  you  expose  it. 
"  Very  sincerely, 

" RUDYARD  KIPLING." 
87 


A  KEN  OF  KIPLING. 

Mr.  Kipling  tells  this  story  of  his 
father :  "  Kipling,  Sr. ,  went  to  pay  a 
visit  to  an  Indian  rajah,  who  was  about 
to  bring  home  a  queen.  The  elder 
Kipling  had  been  engaged  in  the  deco- 
rations of  the  palace,  and  its  owner 
showed  him  the  gifts  of  stuffs  and  per- 
fumes he  had  procured  for  his  coming 
spouse.  The  rajah  also  sent  for  his 
jewel  caskets,  and  asked  Mr.  Kipling 
to  assist  him  in  selecting  the  gems  to 
be  included  in  the  marriage  gifts. 
They  were  of  extraordinary  size  and 
value,  such  gems  as  are  seldom  seen 
except  in  the  East,  and  to  the  artist  the 
selection  was  a  pleasure.  Finally  he 
lifted  a  wonderful  diamond,  one  of  the 
choicest  gems  in  the  collection,  and 
said:  '  You  should  send  this.  No  wo- 
man could  resist  it. '  The  rajah  looked 
up,  caught  it,  and  held  it  jealously  to 

his  breast.     Then,  slowly  replacing  it 
88 


ANECDOTES  OF  KIPLING. 

in  the  casket,   answered:    *  Nay,   such 
gems  be  not  for  women. '  " 

*     * 
* 

Mr.  Kipling,  one  night  in  a  concert 
hall,  saw  two  young  men  ply  two  girls 
with  liquor  until  they  were  drunk. 
They  then  led  them,  staggering,  down 
a  dark  street.  "  Then,"  he  says,  "  I  be- 
came a  Prohibitionist.  Better  it  is  that 
a  man  should  go  without  his  beer  in 
public  places,  and  content  himself  with 
swearing  at  the  narrow-mindedness 
of  the  majority;  better  it  is  to  poison 
the  inside  with  very  vile  temperance 
drinks,  and  to  buy  lager  furtively  at 
back  doors,  than  to  bring  temptation 
to  the  lips  of  young  fools  such  as  the 
four  I  had  seen.  I  understand  now 
why  the  preachers  rage  against  drink. 
I  have  said :  *  There  is  no  harm  in  it, 
taken  moderately '  ;  and  yet  my  own 

demand  for  beer  helped  directly  to  send 
89 


A  KEN  OF  KIPLING. 

these  two  girls  reeling  down  the  dark 
street  to — God  alone  knows  what  end. 
If  liquor  is  worth  drinking,  it  is  worth 
taking  a  little  trouble  to  come  at — such 
trouble  as  a  man  will  undergo  to  com- 
pass his  own  desires.  It  is  not  good 
that  we  should  let  it  lie  before  the  eyes 
of  children,  and  I  have  been  a  fool  in 
writing  to  the  contrary. " 

*     * 
* 

At  the  time  he  wrote  "The  Last 
Chanty "  some  one  asked  him  how  he 
pronounced  it.  "Well,"  he  replied, 
"  the  really  elegant  and  well-bred  peo- 
ple pronounce  it  '  Chanty, '  but  those 
who  know  what  they  are  talking  about 
call  it '  Shanty. '  " 

*  * 
* 

When  in  New  York,  Mr.  Kipling  fre- 
quents the  University  Club.  Being  of 
a  rather  retiring  sort,  personally,  it  was 

a  long  time  before  he  came  to  be  well 
90 


ANECDOTES  OF  KIPLING. 

known  to  the  majority  of  the  club's 
habitue's,  and  two  of  the  members 
made  his  acquaintance  one  day  in  a 
rather  odd  way.  The  two  friends  went 
into  the  club  restaurant,  choosing  a 
table  next  to  one  occupied  by  a  quiet- 
looking  man  who  was  devouring  a 
chop  and  drinking  a  glass  of  ale  all  by 
himself.  One  of  Kipling's  books  had 
just  come  out,  and  the  friends  fell  to 
discussing  it  with  vigor.  Before  long 
they  were  estimating  all  the  Kipling 
writings  in  the  frankest  and  most  ingen- 
uous fashion.  Being  healthy-minded 
men  and  of  good  literary  tastes,  they 
both  thought  well  of  his  productions  on 
the  whole,  and  said  so  plainly;  yet 
they  each  had  found  a  few  flies  in  the 
amber,  and  they  naturally  talked  about 
them.  Some  of  the  defects  which  they 
had  noticed  seemed  to  the  speakers  to 
be  really  serious,  and  one  of  them  said 
91 


A  KEN  OF  KIPLING. 

somebody  ought  to  draw  Kipling's  at- 
tention to  them.  At  just  about  that 
time  the  stranger  at  the  adjoining  table 
faced  about,  got  up  from  his  seat,  and 
walked  over  to  the  critics. 

"I  hope  you'll  pardon  me,"  he  said, 
smiling  widely  upon  them,  "  but  I  have 
been  obliged  to  listen  to  your  conversa- 
tion for  quite  a  long  while,  and  I've 
become  so  much  interested  in  it  that 
I'd  like  to  join  in.  Besides,  my  name 
happens  to  be  Rudyard  Kipling,  and  it 
isn't  fair  for  me  to  sit  still  and  listen 
without  making  myself  known.  But 
possibly  I'll  be  able  to  explain  some 
things  to  you,  and  I'm  sure  I  shall  de- 
rive a  good  deal  of  benefit  from  your 
talk." 

And    the    three    of    them    derived 

much  benefit. 

*     * 
* 

An  American  who  was  in  company 
92 


AN   ORIGINAL    DI 


ANECDOTES  OF  KIPLING. 

with  Mr.  Kipling  in  a  ramble  about 
London  tells  this  story: 

"  One  afternoon  we  went  together  to 
the  Zoo,  and,  while  strolling  about, 
our  ears  were  assailed  by  the  most 
melancholy  sound  I  have  ever  heard — 
a  complaining,  fretting,  lamenting 
sound  proceeding  from  the  elephant 
house. 

"  '  What's  the  matter  in  there?  '  asked 
Mr.  Kipling  of  the  keeper. 

" '  A  sick  elephant,  sir ;  he  cries  all 
the  time;  we  don't  know  what  to  do 
with  him, '  was  the  answer. 

"  Mr.  Kipling  hurried  away  from  me 
in  the  direction  of  the  lament,  which 
was  growing  louder  and  more  painful. 
I  followed,  and  saw  him  go  up  close  to 
the  cage,  where  stood  an  elephant  with 
sadly  drooped  ears  and  trunk.  He  was 
crying  actual  tears  at  the  same  time 
that  he  mourned  his  lot  most  audibly. 
93 


A  KEN  OF  KIPLING. 

In  another  moment  Mr.  Kipling  was 
right  up  at  the  bars,  and  I  heard  him 
speak  to  the  sick  beast  in  a  language 
that  may  have  been  elephantese,  but 
certainly  was  not  English.  Instantly 
the  whining  stopped,  the  ears  were 
lifted,  the  monster  turned  his  sleepy, 
little,  suffering  eyes  upon  his  visitor, 
and  put  out  his  trunk.  Mr.  Kipling 
began  to  caress  it,  still  speaking  in  the 
same  soothing  tone,  and  in  words  unin- 
telligible to  me  at  least. 

"  After  a  few  minutes  the  beast  be- 
gan to  answer  in  a  much  lower  tone  of 
voice,  and  evidently  recounted  his 
woes.  Possibly  elephants,  when  'en- 
joying poor  health,'  like  to  confide 
their  symptoms  to  sympathizing  listen- 
ers as  much  as  do  some  human  inva- 
lids. Certain  it  was  that  Mr.  Kipling 
and  that  elephant  carried  on  a  conver- 
sation, with  the  result  that  the  ele- 
94 


ANECDOTES  OF  KIPLING. 

phant  found  his  spirits  much  cheered 
and  improved.  The  whine  went  out  of 
his  voice,  he  forgot  that  he  was  much 
to  be  pitied,  he  began  to  exchange  ex- 
periences with  his  friend,  and  he  was 
quite  unconscious,  as  was  Mr.  Kipling, 
of  the  amused  and  interested  crowd  col- 
lecting about  the  cage.  At  last,  with 
a  start,  Mr.  Kipling  found  himself  and 
his  elephant  the  observed  of  all  observ- 
ers, and  beat  a  hasty  retreat,  leaving 
behind  him  a  very  different  creature 
from  the  one  he  had  found. 

"  '  Doesn't  that  beat  everything  you 
ever  saw? '  ejaculated  a  compatriot  of 
mine,  as  the  elephant  trumpeted  a  loud 
and  cheerful  good-by  to  the  back  of  his 
vanishing  suitor;  and  I  agreed  with 
him  that  it  did. 

"  *  What  language  were  you  talking 
to  that  elephant? '  I  asked  when  I  over- 
took my  friend. 

95 


A  KEN  OF  KIPLING. 

" '  Language?  What  do  you  mean? ' 
he  answered  with  a  laugh. 

"'Are  you  a  Mowgli? '  I  persisted; 
*  and  can  you  talk  to  all  those  beasts  in 
their  own  tongues? '  but  he  only  smiled 

in  reply."  ,    ^ 

* 

Mr.  Dooley,  the  American  humorist, 
has  this  to  say  of  Mr.  Kipling:  "  What 
I  like  about  Kipling  is  that  his  pomes 
is  r-right  off  th'  bat,  like  me  con-versa- 
tions  with  you,  me  boy.  He's  a  min- 
yitman,  a  r-ready  pote  that  sleeps  like 
thf  dhriver  iv  truck  9,  with  his  poetic 
pants  in  his  boots  beside  his  bed  an' 
him  r-ready  to  jump  out  an'  slide  down 
th'  pole  th'  minyit  th'  alarm  sounds. " 

*     * 
* 

Certain  persons  sending  out  a  penny 
magazine  called  the  The  School  Bud- 
get, intended  for  the  enlightenment 

of  Horsmonden  School  in  Kent,  asked 
96 


ANECDOTES  OF  KIPLING. 

Rudyard  Kipling  to  write  something 
for  them,  the  rate  to  be  paid  him  being 
25.  per  one  thousand  words.  The  edi- 
tors quoted  Kipling's  lines: 

"  The  song  I  sing  for  the  good  red  gold 
The  same  I  sing  for  the  white  money ; 
But  the  best  I  sing  for  the  clout  o'  meal 
That  simple  people  give  me." 

If  he  did  not  write  for  them  at  the 
rate  of  zs.  per  one  thousand  words,  the 
publishers  said  they  would  score  him 
in  their  very  next  issue.  Mr.  Kipling 
evidently  was  alarmed,  for  he  sent  them 
the  following: 

"  Easter  Monday,  1898. 
"  To  the  Editors  School  Budget: 

"  GENTLEMEN  :  I  am  in  receipt  of  your 
letter  of  no  date,  together  with  a  copy 
of  The  School  Budget,  February  14; 
and  you  seem  to  be  in  possession  of  all 
the  cheek  that  is  in  the  least  likely  to 
do  you  any  good  in  this  world  or  the 
next.  And,  furthermore,  you  have 
7  97 


A  KEN  OF  KIPLING. 

omitted  to  specify  where  your  journal 
is  printed  and  in  what  county  of  Eng- 
land Horsmonden  is  situated. 

"  But,  on  the  other  hand,  and  not- 
withstanding, I  very  much  approve  of 
your  '  Hints  on  Schoolboy  Etiquette,' 
and  have  taken  the  liberty  of  sending 
you  a  few  more,  as  following: 

"  i.  If  you  have  any  doubts  about  a 
quantity,  cough.  In  three  cases  out  of 
five  this  will  save  you  being  asked  to 
*  say  it  again. ' 

"  2.  The  two  most  useful  boys  in  a 
form  are  (a)  the  master's  favorite, 
pro  tern,  (b)  his  pet  aversion.  With  a 
little  judicious  management  (a)  can 
keep  him  talking  through  the  first  half 
of  the  construe,  and  (b)  can  take  up 
the  running  for  the  rest  of  the  time. 
N.  B. — A  syndicate  should  arrange  to 
do  (b's)  imposts  in  return  for  this  ser- 
vice. 

"  3.  A  confirmed  guesser  is  worth 
his  weight  in  gold  on  a  Monday  morn- 
ing. 

"4.  Never  shirk  a  master  out  of 
98 


ANECDOTES  OF  KIPLING. 

bounds.  Pass  him  with  an  abstracted 
eye,  and  at  the  same  time  pull  out  a 
letter  and  study  it  earnestly.  He  may 
think  it  is  a  commission  or  some  one 
else. 

"5.  When  pursued  by  the  native 
farmer  always  take  to  the  nearest  plow- 
land.  Men  stick  in  furrows  that  boys 
can  run  over. 

"6.  If  it  is  necessary  to  take  other 
people's  apples,  do  it  on  a  Sunday. 
You  can  then  put  them  inside  your 
topper,  which  is  better  than  trying  to 
button  them  into  a  tight  '  Eton. ' 

"You  will  find  this  advice  worth 
enormous  sums  of  money,  but  I  shall 
be  obliged  with  a  check  or  postal  order 
for  6d.  at  your  earliest  convenience,  if 
the  contribution  should  be  found  to  fill 
more  than  one  page. 

"  Faithfully  yours, 

"  RUDYARD  KIPLING." 

*** 

When  Mr.  Kipling  was  once  asked 
where  he  obtained  the  material  for  his 
99 


A  KEN  OF  KIPLING. 

wonderful  story  of  the  "White  Seal," 
in  one  of  the  "Jungle  Books,"  he  an- 
swered: "I  have  seen  it  all  with  my 

own  eyes.  "  #    ^ 

* 

Everywhere  he  goes  his  friends  be- 
seech him  to  write  Mulvaney  tales. 
Recently  some  one  again  questioned 
him  on  the  reason  of  Mulvaney  's 
silence,  and  he  answered  whimsi- 
cally: "Terrance  hasn't  reported  for 
duty  in  months.  Drunk  again,  I  sup- 


In  a  published  interview,  Mr.  James 
Whitcomb  Riley,  the  poet  of  the  peo- 
ple, said  of  Kipling: 

"  A  lot  of  fellows,  who  know  of  Kip- 
ing's  early  history,  think  that  he  just 
did  it  —  that  he  just  happened.  But 
that  fellow  was  hustling  around  news- 
paper offices  from  the  time  he  was  thir- 


ANECDOTES  OF  KIPLING. 

teen  years  old.  Born  and  brought  up 
among  a  strange  people,  with  queer 
customs,  he  was  for  years  gathering 
material  for  his  work. 

"  He  has  the  greatest  curiosity  of  any 
man  I  ever  knew ;  everything  interests 
him.  In  fact,  he  is  a  regular  literary 
blotting-pad,  soaking  up  everything  on 
the  face  of  the  earth.  Who  before 
Kipling  ever  gave  us  animal  talk? 
'JEsop's  Fables'  were  kindergarten 
talk  compared  with  his.  Think  of  a 
man  only  thirty-two  years  old  who  has 
given  to  the  world  eleven  volumes  of 
prose  and  verse!  He  has  only  just 
started. 

"  Another  thing :  read  him  from  be- 
ginning to  end,  study  him,  become  as 
familiar  with  his  work  as  you  will — 
every  new  bit  from  him  displays  some 
trait,  some  line  of  thought  that  is  new. 

That  man  is  great." 
101 


A  KEN  OF  KIPLING. 

Mr.  Kipling's  phrasing  is  picturesque 
in  the  extreme.  Meeting  a  friend  once, 
after  a  long  separation,  he  said :  "  Good 
heaven !  How  much  water  has  flowed 
under  the  bridges  since  we  two  met!  " 


In  Rottingdean,  England,  where  Mr. 
Kipling  lives,  there  is  a  hotel,  the 
White  Horse  by  name,  kept  by  an  old 
gentleman  named  Welfare.  Mr.  Kip- 
ling frequently  passed  his  evenings 
with  this  Welfare,  and  together  they 
smoked  and  discussed  politics.  Wel- 
fare was  a  strong  Radical,  and  Mr. 
Kipling  an  advanced  imperialist.  One 
can  imagine,  therefore,  that  these  were 
spirited  meetings.  Finally  Mr.  Wel- 
fare fell  ill.  Mr.  Kipling  called  just  as 
usual,  and  he  would  sit  by  the  bedside 
and  talk.  As  before,  they  bolted  poli- 
tics and  talked  crosswise  and  flung 


ANECDOTES  OF  KIPLING. 

their  lances.  It  was  the  practice  of 
the  doctor  to  call  quite  late  and  take  his 
patient's  temperature,  and  he  always 
wondered  to  find  him,  in  what  should 
have  been  the  quietest  hour  of  the  day, 
heated  and  perturbed.  This  went  on 
for  several  days — the  doctor  wonder- 
ing, Mr.  Kipling  arguing,  and  Mr. 
Welfare  igniting — until  the  maids  let 
out  the  secret  of  the  nightly  discussion. 
Then  the  surgeon  came  to  the  writer's 
house. 

"Mr.  Kipling,"  said  he,  "you  must 
call  no  more  at  the  White  Horse. " 

"  Why  not?  "  said  Kipling. 

"Because,"  said  the  doctor,  "you  are 
killing  the  landlord.  On  Monday  when 
you  had  gone  his  temperature  increased 
seven  degrees,  Tuesday  it  increased 
eight,  and  last  night  when  I  called  it 
had  gone  up  nine.  At  this  rate  you'll 

burn  the  house  down. " 
103 


A  KEN  OF  KIPLING. 

Mr.  Kipling  sold  a  book  to  a  London 
publisher  at  a  price  that  netted  the 
author  one  shilling  a  word.  The  pub- 
lication of  this  fact  came  under  the 
notice  of  a  Fleet  Street  humorist,  who, 
"  for  the  fun  of  the  thing,"  wrote  to  the 
author,  saying  that,  as  wisdom  seems 
to  be  quoted  at  retail  prices,  he  himself 
would  like  one  word,  for  which  he  en- 
closed a  shilling  postal  order.  The  re- 
ply came  in  due  course.  Mr.  Kipling 
had  kept  the  shilling  postal  order,  and 
politely  returned  the  one  significant 
word  "  Thanks ! "  written  on  a  large 

sheet  of  writing  paper. 

*      * 
* 

Writing  from  Chicago,  in  his  younger 
days,  Mr.  Kipling  said: 

"  I  have  struck  a  city — a  real  city — 
and  they  call  it  Chicago.  Having  seen 
it,  I  urgently  desire  never  to  see  it 

again.     It  is  inhabited  by  savages." 
104 


ANECDOTES  OF  KIPLING. 

Here  is  Mr.  Kipling's  delightful  com- 
ment upon  the  daughters  of  Uncle 
Sam: 

"  Sweet  and  comely  are  the  maidens 
of  Devonshire ;  delicate  and  of  gracious 
seeming  those  who  live  in  the  pleas- 
ant places  of  London ;  fascinating,  for 
all  their  demureness,  the  damsels  of 
France,  clinging  closely  to  their  moth- 
ers, with  large  eyes  wondering  at  the 
wicked  world;  excellent  in  her  own 
place  and  to  those  who  understand  her 
is  the  Anglo-Indian  4  spin  '  in  her  sec- 
ond season;  but  the  girls  of  America 
are  above  and  beyond  them  all.  They 
are  clever,  they  can  talk — yea,  it  is 
said  that  they  think.  Certainly  they 
have  an  appearance  of  so  doing  which 

is  delightfully  deceptive." 

*     * 
* 

When  Mrs.   Kipling   presented  her 
husband  with  a  son,  the  first  male  heir 
10S 


A  KEN  OF  KIPLING. 

of  the  Kipling  house,  the  event  was 
considered  of  enough  importance  by 
the  press  to  announce  the  fact  by  tele- 
graph in  the  newspapers.  The  news 
reaching  San  Francisco,  inspired  a  local 
poet  to  pen  these  lines: 

KIPLING-ON-PARADE. 

"  What  is  the  baby  crying  for  ?  "  said  Kipling- 

on -Parade. 
"Oh,  walk  with  it,  just  walk  with  it,"  the 

Mamma  Kipling  said. 
"What  makes  it  yell  so  loud,  so  loud?"   said 

Kipling-on-Parade. 
"It  wants  to  trot  to  Mandalay,"  the  Mamma 

Kipling  said. 
'E  is  walkin'  with  the  baby,  in  the  bedroom's 

'ollow  square ; 
The  babe,   it  will  not  sleep  at  all,  which 

makes  the  poet  swear ; 
'E's  nothin'  but  'is  slippers  on — 'is  face  is 

full  of  care ; 
An'  'e'll  walk  an'  trot  the  baby  until  mornin'. 

"Oh,  what  was  it  that  once  I  wrote?"  groaned 

Kipling-on-Parade. 
"O'  single  men  in  barrack-rooms?"  Then  Mrs. 

Kipling  said : 

1 06 


ANECDOTES  OF  KIPLING. 

"  'Twas  '  Please  to  walk  in  front  sir, '  and  Rud- 

yard,  I'm  afraid 
That  the  'trouble'  which  you  mentioned  has 

the  baby's  sleep  delayed." 
'E  is  walkin'  with  the  baby,  which  is  cryin' 

more  and  more ; 
"There's  worser  things  than  marchin*  from 

Umballa  to  Cawnpore." 
Now  it's  "special  train  for  Atkins"  as  'e 

strides  across  the  floor— 
Oh,   the   baby'll   go    to    sleep    to-morrow 

mornin'. 

"It's  cot   is    right-  'and  cot  to   mine,"  said 

Kipling-on-Parade. 
"Oh,  baby  will  not  sleep,  I  know,"  the  Mamma 

Kipling  said. 
"I've  walked  this  floor  a  thousand  times,"  said 

Kipling-on-Parade. 
"Alas!   that  baby  suffers  so.'"    the  Mamma 

Kipling  said. 
Now,  barrack  days  are  in  'is  mind,  in  spite 

o'  baby's  yell; 
An'  though  'is  "  'eels are  blistered"  an'  they 

"feels  to  'urtlike  'ell," 
'E  "drops  some  tallow  "  in  'is  socks,  an'  that 

does  "make  'em  well." 
An*  so  'e  keeps  a-marchin'  on  'til  mornin'. 

"Fix  up  some  paregoric,  dear,"  said  Kipling- 
on-Parade. 

107 


A  KEN  OF  KIPLING. 

'We  used  it  all  two  days  ago,"  the  Mamma 

Kipling  said. 
'  Then  peppermint  or  catnip  tea, "  said  Kipling- 

on-Parade. 
'We're  out  of  both— do  walk  some  more,"  the 

Mamma  Kipling  said. 
An'  now  the  sun  is  rising,  for  at  last  has 

come  the  day. 
An'  'ittle  baby,  gone  to  sleep,  is  smilin',  as 

to  say : 
'Oh,  thank   you,   Mister   Atkins,    for   this 

bloomin'  night  o'  play, 
An'  now  I'm  only  sorry  that  it's  mornin'. '" 


1 08 


VI. 

KIPLING  AND  MARK  TWAIN. 

IN  1890,  in  the  month  of  August, 
when  Rudyard  Kipling  arrived  in  New 
York  a  poor,  struggling,  young  jour- 
nalist, he  secured  a  commission  from 
a  metropolitan  newspaper  to  interview 
Mark  Twain  at  his  home  in  Elmira. 
Thither  Mr.  Kipling  journeyed,  and 
afterward,  in  the  printed  account  of  his 
visit,  he  described  the  temptation 
which  had  beset  him  to  steal  the  great 
humorist's  corncob  pipe  as  a  relic.  It 
was  a  delicate  touch  of  homage,  coming 
from  the  man  who  has  done  more  than 
any  other  to  carry  on  the  traditions 

established  by  the    American  writer, 
109 


A  KEN  OF  KIPLING. 

and  in  so  doing  in  a  large  measure  to 
supersede  him. 

How  quickly  came  the  good  fortune 
of  the  British  Indian  and  the  misfor- 
tunes of  the  American.  The  appear- 
ance of  "Departmental  Ditties"  and 
"  Barrack- Room  Ballads  "  soon  marked 
the  beginning  of  a  new  sledge-hammer 
pen  in  literature.  British  India  moved 
rapidly  to  the  fore,  and  to-day  Mr. 
Rudyard  Kipling  is  the  ideal  mas- 
culine writer,  and  his  is  the  pipe 
that  is  coveted  by  boys  and  elemental 
men. 

As  a  tribute  to  the  journalistic  labors 
of  Mr.  Kipling,  as  a  compliment  to 
Mark  Twain,  and  to  the  credit  of  the 
New  York  Herald,  I  append  hereto  the 
story  of  Mr.  Kipling's  interview  with 
Mark  Twain,  as  it  originally  appeared 
in  The  Herald  over  Mr.  Kipling's  sig- 
nature, on  August  xyth,  1890. 


KIPLING  AND  MARK  TWAIN. 

AN    INTERVIEW    WITH    MARK    TWAIN. 

You  are  a  contemptible  lot  out  there, 
over  yonder.  Some  of  you  are  Com- 
missioners, and  some  Lieutenant-Gov- 
ernors, and  some  have  the  V.  C.,  and  a 
few  are  privileged  to  walk  about  the 
Mall  arm  in  arm  with  the  Viceroy ;  but 
I  have  seen  Mark  Twain  this  golden 
morning,  have  shaken  his  hand,  and 
smoked  a  cigar — no,  two  cigars — with 
him,  and  talked  with  him  for  more 
than  two  hours!  Understand  clearly 
that  I  do  not  despise  you;  indeed,  I 
don't.  I  am  only  very  sorry  for  you 
all,  from  the  Viceroy  downward.  To 
soothe  your  envy  and  to  prove  that  I 
still  regard  you  as  my  equals,  I  will  tell 
you  all  about  it. 

They  said  in  Buffalo  that  he  was  in 
Hartford,  Conn. ;  and  again  they  said 
perchance  he  is  gone  upon  a  journey  to 
Portland,  Me. ;  and  a  big,  fat  drummer 
vowed  that  he  knew  the  great  man  inti- 
mately, and  that  Mark  was  spending 
the  summer  in  Europe — which  infor- 


A  KEN  OF  KIPLING. 

mation  so  upset  me  that  I  embarked 
upon  the  wrong  train,  and  was  incon- 
tinently turned  out  by  the  conductor 
three-quarters  of  a  mile  from  the  sta- 
tion, amid  the  wilderness  of  railway 
tracks.  Have  you  ever,  encumbered 
with  great  coat  and  valise,  tried  to 
dodge  diversely-minded  locomotives 
when  the  sun  was  shining  in  your  eyes? 
But  I  forgot  that  you  have  not  seen 
Mark  Twain,  you  people  of  no  account ! 

Saved  from  the  jaws  of  the  cow- 
catcher, I  wandered  devious,  a  stranger 
met. 

"  Elmira  is  the  place.  Elmira  in  the 
State  of  New  York— this  State,  not 
two  hundred  miles  away";  and  he 
added,  perfectly  unnecessarily,  "  Slide, 
Kelly,  slide." 

I  slid  on  the  West  Shore  line,  I  slid 
till  midnight,  and  they  dumped  me 
down  at  the  door  of  a  frowzy  hotel  in 
Elmira.  Yes,  they  knew  all  about 
"that  man  Clemens,"  but  reckoned  he 
was  not  in  town ;  had  gone  East  some- 
where. I  had  better  possess  my  soul 


KIPLING  AND  MARK  TWAIN. 

in  patience  till  the  morrow,  and  then 
dig  up  the  "  man  Clemens'  "  brother-in- 
law,  who  was  interested  in  coal. 

The  idea  of  chasing  half  a  dozen 
relatives  in  addition  to  Mark  Twain 
up  and  down  a  city  of  thirty  thousand 
inhabitants  kept  me  awake.  Morning 
revealed  Elmira,  whose  streets  were 
desolated  by  railway  tracks,  and  whose 
suburbs  were  given  up  to  the  manufac- 
ture of  door  sashes  and  window  frames. 
It  was  surrounded  by  pleasant,  fat, 
little  hills,  trimmed  with  timber  and 
topped  with  cultivation.  The  Che- 
mung  River  flowed  generally  up  and 
down  the  town,  and  had  just  finished 
flooding  a  few  of  the  main  streets. 

The  hotel  man  and  the  telephone 
man  assured  me  that  the  much-desired 
brother-in-law  was  out  of  town,  and  no 
one  seemed  to  know  where  "  the  man 
Clemens"  abode.  Later  on  I  discov- 
ered that  he  had  not  summered  in  that 
place  for  more  than  nineteen  seasons, 
and  so  was  comparatively  a  new  ar- 
rival. 

8  113 


A  KEN  OF  KIPLING. 

A  friendly  policeman  volunteered  the 
news  that  he  had  seen  Twain  or  some 
one  very  like  him  driving  a  buggy  on 
the  previous  day.  This  gave  me  a  de- 
lightful sense  of  nearness  to  the  great 
author.  Fancy  living  in  a  town  where 
you  could  see  the  author  of  "  Tom  Saw- 
yer," or  "  some  one  very  like  him,"  jolt- 
ing over  the  pavements  in  a  buggy ! 

"  He  lives  out  yonder  at  East  Hill," 
said  the  policeman;  "three  miles  from 
here." 

Then  the  chase  began — in  a  hired 
hack,  up  an  awful  hill,  where  sunflow- 
ers blossomed  by  the  roadside,  and 
crops  waved,  and  Harper's  Magazine 
cows  stood  in  eligible  and  commanding 
attitudes  knee  deep  in  clover,  all  ready 
to  be  transferred  to  photogravure. 
The  great  man  must  have  been  perse- 
cuted by  outsiders  aforetime,  and  fled 
up  the  hill  for  refuge. 

Presently  the  driver  stopped  at  a 
miserable,  little,  white  wood  shanty, 
and  demanded  "  Mister  Clemens." 

"  I  know  he's  a  big  bug  and  all  that," 
114 


KIPLING  AND  MARK  TWAIN. 

he  explained,  "  but  you  can  never  tell 
what  sort  of  notions  those  sort  of  men 
take  it  into  their  heads  to  live  in,  any- 
ways." 

There  rose  up  a  young  lady  who  was 
sketching  thistle  tops  and  golden  rod, 
amid  a  plentiful  supply  of  both,  and 
set  the  pilgrimage  on  the  right  path. 

"It's  a  pretty  Gothic  house  on  the 
left-hand  side  a  little  way  farther  on. " 

"Gothic  h ,"  said  the  driver. 

"  Very  few  of  the  city  hacks  take  this 
drive,  specially  if  they  knew  they  are 
coming  out  here,"  and  he  glared  at  me 
savagely. 

It  was  a  very  pretty  house,  anything 
but  Gothic,  clothed  with  ivy,  standing 
in  a  very  big  compound,  and  fronted  by 
a  veranda  full  of  all  sorts  of  chairs  and 
hammocks  for  lying  in  all  sorts  of  posi- 
tions. The  roof  of  the  veranda  was  a 
trellis-work  of  creepers,  and  the  sun 
peeped  through  and  moved  on  the  shin- 
ing boards  below. 

Decidedly  this  remote  place  was  an 
ideal  one  for  working  in,  if  a  man 
"5 


A  KEN  OF  KIPLING. 

could  work  among  these  soft  airs  and 
the  murmur  of  the  long-eared  crops 
just  across  the  stone  wall. 

Appeared  suddenly  a  lady  used  to 
dealing  with  rampageous  outsiders. 
"  Mr.  Clemens  has  just  walked  down- 
town. He  is  at  his  brother-in-law's 
house. " 

Then  he  was  within  shouting  dis- 
tance, after  all,  and  the  chase  had  not 
been  in  vain.  With  speed  I  fled,  and 
the  driver,  skidding  the  wheel  and 
swearing  audibly,  arrived  at  the  bottom 
of  that  hill  without  accidents.  It  was 
in  the  pause  that  followed  between 
ringing  the  brother-in-law's  bell  and 
getting  an  answer  that  it  occurred  to 
me  for  the  first  time  Mark  Twain 
might  possibly  have  other  engage- 
ments than  the  entertainment  of  es- 
caped lunatics  from  India,  be  they  ever 
so  full  of  admiration.  And  in  another 
man's  house  —  anyhow,  what  had  I 
come  to  do  or  say?  Suppose  the  draw- 
ing-room should  be  full  of  people,  a 
levee  of  crowned  heads;  suppose  a 
116 


KIPLING  AND  MARK  TWAIN. 

baby  were  sick  anywhere,  how  was  I  to 
explain  I  only  wanted  to  shake  hands 
with  him? 

Then  things  happened  somewhat  in 
this  order.  A  big,  darkened  drawing- 
room  ;  a  huge  chair ;  a  man  with  eyes, 
a  mane  of  grizzled  hair,  a  brown  mous- 
tache covering  a  mouth  as  delicate  as  a 
woman's,  a  strong,  square  hand  shak- 
ing mine,  and  the  slowest,  calmest, 
levellest  voice  in  all  the  world  saying : 

"  Well,  you  think  you  owe  me  some- 
thing, and  you've  come  to  tell  me  so. 
That's  what  I  call  squaring  a  debt 
handsomely. " 

"Piff!"  from  a  cob  pipe  (I  always 
said  that  a  Missouri  meerschaum  was 
the  best  smoking  in  the  world),  and, 
behold!  Mark  Twain  had  curled  him- 
self up  in  the  big  armchair,  and  I  was 
smoking  reverently,  as  befits  one  in  the 
presence  of  his  superior. 

The  thing  that  struck  me  first  was 

that  he  was  an  elderly  man ;  yet,  after 

a  minute's  thought,  I  perceived  that  it 

was  otherwise,  and  in  five  minutes,  the 

117 


A  KEN  OF  KIPLING. 

eyes  looking  at  me,  I  saw  that  the  gray 
hair  was  an  accident  of  the  most  trivial 
kind.  He  was  quite  young.  I  was 
shaking  his  hand.  I  was  smoking  his 
cigar,  and  I  was  hearing  him  talk — this 
man  I  had  learned  to  love  and  admire 
fourteen  thousand  miles  away. 

Reading  his  books,  I  had  striven  to 
get  an  idea  of  his  personality,  and  all 
my  preconceived  notions  were  wrong 
and  beneath  the  reality.  Blessed  is 
the  man  who  finds  no  disillusion  when 
he  is  brought  face  to  face  with  a  re- 
vered writer.  That  was  a  moment  to 
be  remembered ;  the  land  of  a  twelve- 
pound  salmon  was  nothing  to  it.  I 
had  hooked  Mark  Twain,  and  he  was 
treating  me  as  though  under  certain 
circumstances  I  might  be  an  equal. 

About  this  time  I  became  aware  that 
he  was  discussing  the  copyright  ques- 
tion. Here,  so  far  as  I  remember,  is 
what  he  said.  Attend  to  the  words  of 
the  oracle  through  this  unworthy  me- 
dium transmitted.  You  will  never  be 
able  to  imagine  the  long,  slow  surge  of 
118 


KIPLING  AND  MARK  TWAIN. 

the  drawl,  and  the  deadly  gravity  of 
the  countenance,  any  more  than  the 
quaint  pucker  of  the  body,  one  foot 
thrown  over  the  arm  of  the  chair,  the 
yellow  pipe  clinched  in  one  corner  of 
the  mouth,  and  the  right  hand  casually 
caressing  the  square  chin : 

"  Copyright.  Some  men  have  mor- 
als, and  some  men  have — other  things. 
I  presume  a  publisher  is  a  man.  He  is 
not  born.  He  is  created — by  circum- 
stances. Some  publishers  have  morals. 
Mine  have.  They  pay  me  for  the  Eng- 
lish productions  of  my  books.  When 
you  hear  men  talking  of  Bret  Harte's 
works  and  other  works  and  my  books 
being  pirated,  ask  them  to  be  sure  of 
their  facts.  I  think  they'll  find  the 
books  are  paid  for.  It  was  ever  thus. 

"I  remember  an  unprincipled  and 
formidable  publisher.  Perhaps  he's 
dead  now.  He  used  to  take  my  short 
stories — I  can't  call  it  steal  or  pirate 
them.  It  was  beyond  these  things  al- 
together. He  took  my  stories  one  at  a 
time  and  made  a  book  of  it.  If  I  wrote 
119 


A  KEN  OF  KIPLING. 

an  essay  on  dentistry  or  theology  or 
any  little  thing  of  that  kind — just  an 
essay  that  long  (he  indicated  half  an 
inch  on  his  finger),  any  sort  of  essay — 
that  publisher  would  amend  and  im- 
prove my  essay. 

"  He  would  get  another  man  to  write 
some  more  to  it  or  cut  it  about  exactly 
as  his  needs  required.  Then  he  would 
publish  a  book  called  '  Dentistry  by 
Mark  Twain,'  that  little  essay  and 
some  other  things  not  mine  added. 
Theology  would  make  another  book, 
and  so  on.  I  do  not  consider  that  fair. 
It's  an  insult.  But  he's  dead  now,  I 
think.  I  didn't  kill  him. 

"  There  is  a  great  deal  of  nonsense 
talked  about  international  copyright. 
The  proper  way  to  treat  a  copyright  is 
to  make  it  exactly  like  real  estate  in 
every  way. 

"  It  will  settle  itself  under  these  con- 
ditions. If  Congress  were  to  bring  in 
a  law  that  a  man's  life  was  not  to  ex- 
tend over  a  hundred  and  sixty  years, 
somebody  would  laugh.  It  wouldn't 


KIPLING  AND  MARK  TWAIN. 

concern  anybody.  The  men  would  be 
out  of  the  jurisdiction  of  the  court.  A 
term  of  years  in  copyright  comes  to 
exactly  the  same  thing.  No  law  can 
make  a  book  live  or  cause  it  to  die  be- 
fore the  appointed  time. 

u  Tottletown,  Cal. ,  was  a  new  town, 
with  a  population  of  3,000 — banks,  fire 
brigade,  brick  buildings,  and  all  the 
modern  improvements.  It  lived,  it 
flourished,  and  it  disappeared.  To-day 
no  man  can  put  his  foot  on  any  rem- 
nant of  Tottletown,  Cal.  It's  dead. 
London  continues  to  exist. 

"Bill  Smith,  author  of  a  book  read 
for  the  next  year  or  so,  is  real  estate 
in  Tottletown.  William  Shakespeare, 
whose  works  are  extensively  read,  is 
real  estate  in  London.  Let  Bill  Smith, 
equally  with  Mr.  Shakespeare  now 
deceased,  have  as  complete  a  control 
over  his  copyright  as  he  would  over 
real  estate.  Let  him  gamble  it  away, 
drink  it  away,  or — give  it  to  the  church. 
Let  his  heirs  and  assigns  treat  it  in  the 
same  manner. 

121 


A  KEN  OF  KIPLING. 

"  Every  now  and  again  I  go  up  to 
Washington,  sitting  on  a  board  to  drive 
that  sort  of  view  into  Congress.  Con- 
gress takes  its  arguments  against  in- 
ternational copyright  delivered  ready 
made,  and — Congress  isn't  very  strong. 
I  put  the  real-estate  view  of  the  case 
before  one  of  the  Senators. 

"  He  said :  *  Suppose  a  man  has  writ- 
ten a  book  that  will  live  forever? ' 

"  I  said :  '  Neither  you  nor  I  will  ever 
live  to  see  that  man,  but  we'll  assume 
it.  What  then? ' 

*  He  said :  '  I  want  to  protect  the 
world  against  that  man's  heirs  and 
assigns  working  under  your  theory. ' 

"I  said:  'You  think  all  the  world 

are  as  big  fools  as ,  that  all  the 

world  has  no  commercial  sense.  The 
book  that  will  live  forever  can't  be 
artificially  kept  up  at  inflated  prices. 
There  will  always  be  very  expensive 
editions  of  it  and  cheap  ones  issuing 
side  by  side. ' 

"  Take  the  case  of  Sir  Walter  Scott's 
novels,"  he  continued,  turning  to  me. 

122 


KIPLING  AND  MARK  TWAIN. 

"When  the  copyright  notes  protected 
them,  I  bought  editions  as  expensive 
as  I  could  afford,  because  I  liked  them. 
At  the  same  time  the  same  firm  were 
selling  editions  that  a  cat  might  buy. 
They  had  their  real  estate,  and  not  be- 
ing fools,  recognized  that  one  portion 
of  the  plot  could  be  worked  as  a  gold 
mine,  another  as  a  vegetable  garden, 
and  another  as  a  marble  quarry.  Do 
you  see?" 

What  I  saw  with  the  greatest  clear- 
ness was  Mark  Twain  being  forced  to 
fight  for  the  simple  proposition  that  a 
man  has  as  much  right  in  the  work  of 
his  brains  (think  of  the  heresy  of  it ! ) 
as  in  the  labor  of  his  hands.  When 
the  old  lion  roars,  the  young  whelps 
growl.  I  growled  assentingly,  and  the 
talk  ran  on  from  books  in  general  to  his 
own  in  particular. 

Growing  bold,  and  feeling  that  I 
had  a  few  hundred  thousand  folk  at 
my  back,  I  demanded  whether  Tom 
Sawyer  married  Judge  Thatcher's 
daughter  and  whether  we  were  ever 
123 


A  KEN  OF  KIPLING. 

going  to  hear  of  Tom  Sawyer  as  a 
man. 

"I  haven't  decided,"  quoth  Mark 
Twain,  getting  up,  filling  his  pipe,  and 
walking  up  and  down  the  room  in  his 
slippers.  "  I  have  a  notion  of  writing 
the  sequel  to  *  Tom  Sawyer '  in  two 
ways.  In  one  I  would  make  him  rise 
to  great  honor  and  go  to  Congress,  and 
in  the  other  I  should  hang  him.  Then 
the  friends  and  enemies  of  the  book 
could  take  their  choice. " 

Here  I  lost  my  reverence  completely, 
and  protested  against  any  theory  of 
the  sort,  because,  to  me  at  least,  Tom 
Sawyer  was  real. 

"Oh,  he  is  real,"  said  Mark  Twain. 
"He's  all  the  boy  that  I  have  known  or 
recollect;  but  that  would  be  a  good 
way  of  ending  the  book  " ;  then,  turn- 
ing round,  u  because,  when  you  come 
to  think  of  it,  neither  religion,  train- 
ing, nor  education  avails  anything 
against  the  force  of  circumstances  that 
drive  a  man.  Suppose  we  took  the 
next  four  and  twenty  years  of  Tom 
124 


KIPLING  AND  MARK  TWAIN. 

Sawyer's  life,  and  gave  a  little  joggle 
to  the  circumstances  that  controlled 
him.  He  would  logically  and  accord- 
ing to  the  joggle  turn  out  a  rip  or  an 
angel." 

"  Do  you  believe  that,  then? " 

"I  think  so.  Isn't  it  what  you  call 
kismet? " 

"Yes;  but  don't  give  him  two  jog- 
gles and  show  the  result,  because  he 
isn't  your  property  any  more.  He  be- 
longs to  us. " 

Thereat  he  laughed — a  large,  whole- 
some laugh — and  this  began  a  disserta- 
tion on  the  rights  of  a  man  to  do  what 
he  liked  with  his  own  creations,  which 
being  a  matter  of  purely  professional 
interest,  I  will  mercifully  omit. 

Returning  to  the  big  chair,  he, 
speaking  of  truth  and  the  like  in  liter- 
ature, said  that  an  autobiography  was 
the  one  work  in  which  a  man,  against 
his  own  will  and  in  spite  of  his  utmost 
striving  to  the  contrary,  revealed  him- 
self in  his  true  light  to  the  world. 

*A  good  deal  of  your  life  on  the 
125 


A  KEN  OF  KIPLING. 

Mississippi  is  autobiographical,  isn't 
it? "  I  asked. 

"  As  near  as  it  can  be — when  a  man 
is  writing  to  a  book  and  about  himself. 
But  in  genuine  autobiography,  I  be- 
lieve it  is  impossible  for  a  man  to  tell 
the  truth  about  himself  or  to  avoid 
impressing  the  reader  with  the  truth 
about  himself. 

"  I  made  an  experiment  once.  I  got 
a  friend  of  mine — a  man  painfully  giv- 
en to  speak  the  truth  on  all  occasions — 
a  man  who  wouldn't  dream  of  telling  a 
lie — and  I  made  him  write  his  autobi- 
ography for  his  own  amusement  and 
mine.  He  did  k.  The  manuscript 
would  have  made  an  octavo  volume, 
but — good,  honest  man  that  he  was — in 
every  single  detail  of  his  life  that  I 
knew  about  he  turned  out,  on  paper,  a 
formidable  liar.  He  could  not  help 
himself. 

"It  is  not  in  human  nature  to  write 

the  truth  about  itself.     None  the  less 

the  reader  gets  a  general  impression 

from   an    autobiography  whether  the 

126 


KIPLING  AND  MARK  TWAIN. 

man  is  a  fraud  or  a  good  man.  The 
reader  can't  give  his  reasons  any  more 
than  a  man  can  explain  why  a  woman 
struck  him  as  being  lovely  when  he 
doesn't  remember  her  hair,  eyes,  teeth, 
or  figure.  And  the  impression  that 
the  reader  gets  is  a  correct  one. " 

"  Do  you  ever  intend  writing  an  au- 
tobiography? " 

"  If  I  do,  it  will  be  as  other  men 
have  done — with  the  most  earnest  de- 
sire to  make  myself  out  to  be  the  bet- 
ter man  in  every  little  business  that  has 
been  to  my  discredit ;  and  I  shall  fail, 
like  the  others,  to  make  the  readers 
believe  anything  except  the  truth. " 

This  naturally  led  to  a  discussion  on 
conscience.  Then  said  Mark  Twain, 
and  his  words  are  mighty  and  to  be  re- 
membered: 

*  Your  conscience  is  a  nuisance.  A 
conscience  is  like  a  child.  If  you  pet 
it  and  play  with  it  and  let  it  have 
everything  that  it  wants,  it  becomes 
spoiled  and  intrudes  on  all  your 
amusements  and  most  of  your  griefs. 
127 


A  KEN  OF  KIPLING. 

Treat  your  conscience  as  yon  would 
treat  anything  else.  When  it  is  rebel- 
lious, spank  it — be  severe  with  it,  ar- 
gue with  it,  prevent  it  from  coming  to 
play  with  you  at  all  hours,  and  you  will 
secure  a  good  conscience;  that  is  to 
say,  a  properly  trained  one.  A  spoiled 
one  simply  destroys  all  the  pleasure  in 
life.  I  think  I  have  reduced  mine  to 
order.  At  least,  I  haven't  heard  from 
it  for  some  time.  Perhaps  I  have 
killed  it  from  over-severity.  It's 
wrong  to  kill  a  child,  but,  in  spite  of 
all  I  have  said,  a  conscience  differs 
from  a  child  in  many  ways.  Perhaps 
it's  best  when  it's  dead." 

Here  he  told  me  a  little — such  things 
as  a  man  may  tell  a  stranger — of  his 
early  life  and  upbringing,  and  in  what 
manner  he  had  been  influenced  for 
good  by  the  example  of  his  parents. 
He  spoke  always  through  his  eyes,  a 
light  under  the  heavy  eyebrows ;  anon 
crossing  the  room  with  a  step  as  light 
as  a  girl's,  to  show  me  some  book  or 
other ;  then  resuming  his  walk  up  and 
128 


KIPLING  AND  MARK  TWAIN. 

down  the  room,  puffing  at  the  cob  pipe. 
I  would  have  given  much  for  nerve 
enough  to  demand  the  gift  of  that  pipe 
— value,  five  cents  when  new.  I  un- 
derstood why  certain  savage  tribes 
ardently  desired  the  liver  of  brave  men 
slain  in  combat.  That  pipe  would  have 
given  me,  perhaps,  a  hint  of  his  keen 
insight  into  the  souls  of  men.  But  he 
never  laid  it  aside  within  stealing  reach 
of  my  arms. 

Once,  indeed,  he  put  his  hand  on  my 
shoulder.  It  was  an  investiture  of  the 
Star  of  India,  blue  silk,  trumpets,  and 
diamond-studded  jewel,  all  complete. 
If  hereafter,  in  the  changes  and 
chances  of  this  mortal  life,  I  fall  to 
cureless  ruin,  I  will  tell  the  superin- 
tendent of  the  workhouse  that  Mark 
Twain  once  put  his  hand  on  my  shoul- 
der, and  he  shall  give  me  a  room  to 
myself  and  a  double  allowance  of  pau- 
pers' tobacco. 

"I  never  read  novels  myself,"  said 
he,  u  except  when  the  popular  persecu- 
tion forces  me  to — when  people  plague 
9  "9 


A  KEN  OF  KIPLING. 

me  to  know  what  I  think  of  the  last 
book  that  every  one  is  reading. " 

"  And  how  did  the  latest  persecution 
affect  you?" 

"  Robert? "  said  he  interrogatively. 

I  nodded. 

"I  read  it,  of  course,  for  the  work- 
manship. That  made  me  think  I  had 
neglected  novels  too  long — that  there 
might  be  a  good  many  books  as  grace- 
ful in  style  somewhere  on  the  shelves ; 
so  I  began  a  course  of  novel  reading. 
I  have  dropped  it  now;  it  did  not 
amuse  me.  But  as  regards  Robert,  the 
effect  on  me  was  exactly  as  though  a 
singer  of  street  ballads  were  to  hear 
excellent  music  from  a  church  organ. , 
I  didn't  stop  to  ask  whether  the  music 
was  legitimate  or  necessary.  I  lis- 
tened, and  I  liked  what  I  heard.  I  am 
speaking  of  the  grace  and  beauty  of 
the  style." 

How  is  one    to    behave   when  one 
differs   altogether  with   a  great  man? 
My  business  was  to  be  still  and  to  lis- 
ten.    Yet  Mark — Mark  Twain,  a  man 
130 


KIPLING  AND  MARK  TWAIN. 

who  knew  men — "  big  Injun,  he,ap  big 
Injun,  dam  mighty  heap  big  Injun " 
— master  of  tears  and  mirth,  skilled  in 
wisdom  of  the  true  inwardness  of 
things — was  bowing  his  head  to  the 
labored  truck  of  the  schools  where  men 
act  in  obedience  to  the  books  they  read 
and  keep  their  consciences  in  spirits 
of  homemade  wine.  He  said  the  style 
was  graceful;  therefore  it  must  be 
graceful.  But  perhaps  he  was  making 
fun  of  me.  In  either  case  I  would  lay 
my  hand  upon  my  mouth. 

"You  see,"  he  went  on,  "every  man 
has  his  private  opinion  about  a  book. 
But  that  is  my  private  opinion.  If  I 
had  lived  in  the  beginning  of  things,  I 
should  have  looked  around  the  town- 
ship to  see  what  popular  opinion 
thought  of  the  murder  of  Abel  before 
I  openly  condemned  Cain.  I  should 
have  had  my  private  opinion,  of 
course,  but  I  shouldn't  have  expressed 
it  until  I  had  felt  the  way.  You  have 
my  private  opinion  about  that  book. 
I  don't  know  what  my  public  ones 


A  KEN  OF  KIPLING. 

are  exactly.  They  won't  upset  the 
earth." 

He  recurled  himself  into  the  chair 
and  talked  of  other  things. 

"  I  spend  nine  months  of  the  year 
at  Hartford.  I  have  long  ago  satisfied 
myself  that  there  is  no  hope  of  doing 
much  work  during  those  nine  months. 
People  come  in  and  call.  They  call  at 
all  hours,  about  everything  in  the 
world.  One  day  I  thought  I  would 
keep  a  list  of  interruptions.  It  began 
this  way: 

"  A  man  came  and  would  see  no  one 
but  Mr.  Clemens.  He  was  an  agent 
for  photogravure  reproductions  of  sa- 
lon pictures.  I  very  seldom  use  salon 
pictures  in  my  books. 

"After  that  man  another  man,  who 
refused  to  see  any  one  but  Mr.  Clem- 
ens, came  to  make  me  write  to  Wash- 
ington about  something.  I  saw  him. 
I  saw  a  third  man,  then  a  fourth.  By 
this  time  it  was  noon.  I  had  grown  tired 
of  keeping  the  list.  I  wished  to  rest. 

"  But  the  fifth  man  was  the  only  one 
13* 


KIPLING  AND  MARK  TWAIN. 

of  the  crowd  with  a  card  of  his  own. 
He  sent  up  his  card.  *  Ben  Koontz, 
Hannibal,  Mo.'  I  was  raised  in  Han- 
nibal. Ben  was  an  old  schoolmate  of 
mine.  Consequently  I  threw  the  house 
wide  open  and  rushed  with  both  hands 
out  at  a  big,  fat,  heavy  man,  who  was 
not  the  Ben  I  had  ever  known — nor 
anything  like  him. 

"'But  is  it  you,  Ben?'  I  said. 
'You've  altered  in  the  last  thousand 
years. ' 

"The  fat  man  said:  'Well,  I'm  not 
Koontz  exactly,  but  I  met  him  down  in 
Missouri,  and  he  told  me  to  be  sure 
and  call  on  you,  and  he  gave  me  his 
card,  and '  —  here  he  acted  the  little 
scene  for  my  benefit — '  if  you  can  wait 
a  minute  till  I  can  get  out  the  circulars 
— I'm  not  Koontz  exactly,  but  I'm 
travelling  with  the  fullest  line  of  rods 
you  ever  saw.  * " 

"And  what  happened?"  I  asked 
breathlessly. 

"  I  shut  the  door.  He  was  not  Ben 
Koontz — exactly — not  my  old  school- 
133 


A  KEN  OF  KIPLING. 

fellow,  but  I  had  shaken  him  by  both 
hands  in  love,  and  ...  I  had  been 
bearded  by  a  lightning-rod  man  in  my 
own  house. 

"As  I  was  saying,  I  do  very  little 
work  in  Hartford.  I  come  here  for 
three  months  every  year,  and  I  work 
four  or  five  hours  a  day  in  a  study 
down  the  garden  of  that  little  house  on 
the  hill.  Of  course,  I  do  not  object  to 
two  or  three  interruptions.  When  a 
man  is  in  the  full  swing  of  his  work 
these  little  things  do  not  affect  him. 
Eight  or  ten  or  twenty  interruptions 
retard  composition." 

I  was  burning  to  ask  him  all  manner 
of  impertinent  questions,  as  to  which 
of  his  works  he  himself  preferred,  and 
so  forth;  but,  standing  in  awe  of  his 
eyes,  I  dared  not.  He  spoke  on,  and 
I  listened  grovelling. 

It  was  a  question  of  mental  equip- 
ment that  was  on  the  carpet,  and  I  am 
still  wondering  whether  he  meant  what 
he  said. 

"  Personally  I  never  care  for  fiction 
134 


KIPLING  AND  MARK  TWAIN. 

or  story  books.  What  I  like  to  read 
about  are  facts  and  statistics  of  any 
kind  If  they  are  only  facts  about  the 
raising  of  radishes,  they  interest  me. 
Just  now,  for  instance,  before  you 
came  in " — he  pointed  to  an  encyclo- 
paedia on  the  shelves — "  I  was  reading 
an  article  about  '  Mathematics.'  Per- 
fectly pure  mathematics. 

"  My  own  knowledge  of  mathematics 
stops  at  '  twelve  times  twelve, '  but  I 
enjoyed  that  article  immensely.  I 
didn't  understand  a  word  of  it;  but 
facts,  or  what  a  man  believes  to  be 
facts,  are  always  delightful.  That 
mathematical  fellow  believed  in  his 
facts.  So  do  I.  Get  your  facts  first, 
and  " — the  voice  dies  away  to  an  almost 
inaudible  drone — "  then  you  can  distort 
'em  as  much  as  you  please. " 

Bearing  this  precious  advice  in  my 
bosom,  I  left,  the  great  man  assuring 
me  with  gentle  kindness  that  I  had  not 
interrupted  him  in  the  least.  Once 
outside  the  door,  I  yearned  to  go  back 
and  ask  some  questions — it  was  easy 


A  KEN  OF  KIPLING. 

enough  to  think  of  them  now — but  his 
time  was  his  own,  though  his  books 
belonged  to  me. 

I  should  have  ample  time  to  look 
back  to  that  meeting  across  the  graves 
of  the  days.  But  it  was  sad  to  think 
of  the  things  he  had  not  spoken  about. 

In  San  Francisco  the  men  of  The 
Call  told  me  many  legends  of  Mark's 
apprenticeship  in  their  paper  five  and 
twenty  years  ago;  how  he  was  a  re- 
porter delightfully  incapable  of  report- 
ing according  to  the  needs  of  the  day. 
He  preferred,  so  they  said,  to  coil 
himself  into  a  heap  and  meditate  until 
the  last  minute.  Then  he  would  pro- 
duce copy  bearing  no  sort  of  relation- 
ship to  his  legitimate  work — copy  that 
made  the  editor  swear  horribly,  and 
the  readers  of  The  Call  ask  for  more. 

I  should  like  to  have  heard  Mark's 
version  of  that  and  some  stories  of  his 
joyous  and  variegated  past.  He  has 
been  journeyman  printer  (in  those 
days  he  wandered  from  the  banks  of 
the  Missouri  even  to  Philadelphia),  pi- 
136 


KIPLING  AND  MARK  TWAIN. 

lot  cub  and  full-blown  pilot,  soldier  of 
the  South  (that  was  for  three  weeks 
only),  private  secretary  to  a  Lieuten- 
ant-Governor of  Nevada  (that  dis- 
pleased him),  miner,  editor,  special 
correspondent  in  the  Sandwich  Islands, 
and  the  Lord  only  knows  what  else. 
If  so  experienced  a  man  could  by  any 
means  be  made  drunk,  it  would  be  a 
glorious  thing  to  fill  him  up  with  com- 
posite liquors,  and,  in  the  language  of 
his  own  country,  "let  him  retrospect." 
But  these  eyes  will  never  see  that  orgy 
fit  for  the  gods. 

RUDYARD  KIPLING. 


137 


VII 

THE  KIPLING   BOOKS. 

Following  is  a  reference  list  of  the 
books  written  by  Rudyard  Kipling: 

I. 

QUARTETTE.  CHRISTMAS  ANNUAL.  8vo, 
pp.  125.  Lahore.  1885. 

II. 

ON  HER  MAJESTY'S  SERVICE  ONLY. 
DEPARTMENTAL  DITTIES.  Oblong 
8vo.  Lahore.  1886. 

III. 

PLAIN  TALES  FROM  THE  HILLS.  I2mo. 
pp.283.  Calcutta  and  London.  1888. 

IV. 

SOLDIERS  THREE.  i2mo,  pp.  97.  Allaha- 
bad. 1888. 

138 


THE  KIPLING  BOOKS. 

V. 

THE  STORY  OF  THE  GADSBYS.  I2mo, 
pp.  100.  Allahabad.  N.  D.  (1888.) 

VI. 

IN  BLACK  AND  WHITE.  I2mo,  pp.  106, 
Allahabad.  N.  D.  (1888.) 

VII. 

UNDER  THE  DEODARS.  I2mo,  pp.  106 
Allahabad.  N.  D.  (1888.) 

VIII. 

THE  PHANTOM  'RICKSHAW  AND  OTHER 
TALES.  I2mo,  pp.  104.  Allahabad.  N. 
D.  (1888.) 

IX. 

WEE  WILLIE  WINKIE  AND  OTHER 
STORIES.  I2mo,  pp.  96.  Allahabad.  N. 
D.  (1888.) 

X. 

THE  COURTING  OF  DINAH  SHADD  AND 
OTHER  STORIES.  izmo,  pp.  182. 
New  York.  1890. 

XI. 

DEPARTMENTAL  DITTIES  AND  OTHER 
VERSES.  I2mo,  pp.  121.  Calcutta,  Lon- 
don and  Bombay.  1891. 

139 


A  KEN  OF  KIPLING. 

XII. 
THE  CITY  OF  DREADFUL  NIGHT.     I2mo, 

pp.  96.     Allahabad.     N.  D.     (1891.) 

XIII. 

LIFE'S  HANDICAP.  STORIES  OF  MINE 
OWN  PEOPLE.  I2mo,  pp.  351.  London 
and  New  York.  1891. 

XIV. 

LETTERS  OF  MARQUE.  8vo,  pp.  154. 
Allahabad.  1891. 

XV. 

BARRACK-ROOM  BALLADS  AND  OTHER 
VERSES.  I2mo,  pp.  208.  London.  1892. 

XVI. 

THE  NAULAHKA.  A  STORY  OF  WEST 
AND  EAST.  I2mo,  pp.  276.  London  and 
New  York.  1892. 

XVII. 

BALLADS  AND  BARRACK-ROOM  BAL- 
LADS. I2mo,  pp.  207.  New  York  and  Lon- 
don. 1892. 

XVIII. 

MANY  INVENTIONS.     i2mo,  pp.  365.     Lon- 
don and  New  York.     1893. 
140 


THE  KIPLING  BOOKS. 

XIX. 

THE  JUNGLE  BOOK.     i2mo,  pp.  212.     Lon- 
don and  New  York.     1894. 

XX. 

THE  SECOND  JUNGLE  BOOK.      I2mo,   pp. 
238.     London  and  New  York.     1895. 

XXI. 

THE  SEVEN  SEAS.      i2mo.     London  and  New 

York.     1896. 

XXII. 
SLAVES    OF  THE   LAMP.      izmo.      London 

and  New  York.     1897. 

XXIII. 

CAPTAINS  COURAGEOUS,     izmo,   pp.    387. 
New  York  and  London.     1897. 

XXIV. 

THE  DAY'S  WORK.     I2mo.     New   York   and 
London.     1898. 

XXV. 
A  FLEET  IN  BEING.     London.     1899, 

XXVI. 

STALKY  &  COMPANY.     I2mo.     London  and 
New  York.     1899. 

141 


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